The quartet of Middle East mediators on Friday condemned Israel's plans to build new settler homes in East Jerusalem and said unilateral actions would not be recognized by the international community.
The group - the European Union, the United States, Russia and the United Nations - "condemns Israel's decision to advance planning for new housing units in East Jerusalem."
"The Quartet reaffirms that unilateral actions taken by either party cannot prejudge the outcome of negotiations and will not be recognized by the international community," it added in a statement released at the UN headquarters in New York.
Israel announced Tuesday during a landmark visit by US Vice President Joe Biden that 1,600 new settler homes would be built in predominantly Arab East Jerusalem.
The announcement, triggered fury among Arab and Palestinian leaders, just as fledgling indirect talks appeared to have been coaxed back to life. The Arab League said it was freezing all contacts with the Jewish state, either direct or indirect, until Tel Aviv ended once and for all the construction of Jewish homes on the occupied territories.
Until now the main obstacle to resuming the Israeli-Palestinian talks was the expansion of Jewish settlements on the West Bank. Last November, bowing to US pressure, Israel declared a 10-month suspension on all such construction in the West Bank, but not in East Jerusalem. Earlier this year Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warmed the Arabs that Israel would not move out of the West Bank area. International mediators, including Egypt and several other Arab states, still managed to persuade the conflicting sides to resume indirect talks though.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas now says that Israel's decision to go ahead with settlement construction in East Jerusalem has dashed all these fledgling hopes for peace.
The Mideast Quartet, though criticizing Israel's decision, sticks to a more guarded position on the issue urging Israel and the Palestinians to resume the dialogue and create an atmosphere conducive to resolving the remaining differences, including on the status of East Jerusalem.
Much hope is being pinned on the meeting the Quartet will have in Moscow on the 19th of this month where Russia Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, US Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and EU foreign affairs commissioner Catherine Ashton will sit together to work out a set of measures to put the stuttering Middle East peace process back on track.
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