Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has reiterated Moscow's position on a Middle East peace settlement. In a telephone conversation with Arab League Secretary-General Amr Moussa the minister described Israel's settlement building plans as unacceptable and at odds with the peace process. →
In a telephone conversation with Arab League Secretary General Amr Moussa on Thursday, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas signaled his country's reluctance to start indirect peace talks with Israel "under the present circumstances". →
Chances for the resumption of peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians have dwindled away after the Israeli government unveiled its decision to build 1,600 new homes for Jews in East Jerusalem. →
Russia has called on Israel to terminate all settlement activities in the occupied territories, including East Jerusalem. This announcement →
There has been a burst of diplomatic activity in the Middle East over lately with the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and chief of the Palestinian Administration Mahmoud Abbas paying separate visits to Egypt recently. On Tuesday, the Egyptian foreign minister welcomed his Jordanian, Spanish, Tunisian and French counterparts to a conference in Cairo. →
Russia condemns Israeli housing plans in East Jerusalem. The statement, made by the Foreign Ministry’s spokesman Andrei Nesterenko on Tuesday, follows reports that Israel intends to build another 700 homes for Jews in the Arab part of Jerusalem defying the legal groundwork of the Middle East peace process. →
The Israeli Construction and Housing Ministry has called a tender to build 700 thousand more Jewish homes in occupied East Jerusalem. Israel claims this territory as part of what it calls its eternal capital and keeps it exempt from a 10-month moratorium on settlement development everywhere in the West Bank. →
Just days after the Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu proposed a suspension of West Bank settlement activity, his Cabinet has proclaimed Jewish settlements a national priority and approved millions of dollars for new construction in them. →
Israel’s decision to temporarily halt construction of Jewish settlements in the West Bank could be conducive to a lastng settlement in the Middle East. →
The Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday announced a 10-month partial moratorium on the construction of Jewish settlements in the West Bank. The halt doesn’t embrace the settlements that are already being built as well as construction sites in East Jerusalem. →
In Israel Jerusalem authorities have approved the construction of new settlements in the Eastern part the city. Moscow was very concerned about the news. “These acts are unacceptable for the peacemaking process in the Middle East”, Russia’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Andrei Nesterenko said. →