Abbas proposes 'back-door' peace talks with Israel

Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas has proposed closed-door talks with Israel on some of the Middle East’s most difficult disputes, including the status of Jerusalem and the fate of Palestinian refugees.

“It is the right time to talk,” Abbas said in Cairo after he met Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak.

Recent weeks have seen a growing momentum towards reviving Israeli-Palestinian peace talks.

Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert met Abbas on Saturday and Olmert is expected to meet Mubarak next week at an Egyptian Red Sea resort. The bipartisan panel on Iraq headed by former US secretary of state James Baker said progress on the Israeli-Palestinian dispute could help ease tensions in Iraq.

Egypt, the first Arab country to make peace with Israel, has hosted several rounds of talks among rival Palestinian factions over the years. It has been working to broker a deal between the Jewish state and Hamas for the release of an Israeli soldier captured in June by militants affiliated to the group.

Olmert said last week that he would consider releasing some of the thousands of Palestinian prisoners held by Israel before Cpl Gilad Shalit was freed.

Abbas did not spell out why he was proposing that the negotiations with Israel be “back-door”. But as one of the architects of the 1993 Oslo peace accord between Israel and the Palestinians, he is known to champion quiet, informal diplomacy.

“We have the idea of a backdoor channel between us and the Israelis, with the participation of one or all members of the Quartet to discuss all the issues of the final status,” Abbas said, referring to the Western powers – the US, Russia, European Union and the United Nations – that oversee the peace process.

Abbas said he proposed back-door negotiations to Olmert at their weekend meeting and that the Israeli leader promised to consider the suggestion. He also said he planned to discuss the idea with US secretary of state Condoleezza Rice when she came to the Middle East next month.

Abbas made clear he wanted the talks to focus on the issues that had been the hardest to resolve in previous negotiations.

Those are the future of Palestinian refugees, the sovereignty of Jerusalem - which both Israelis and Palestinians claim as their capital – and the borders of the future Palestinian state.

It is not certain that Olmert would agree to tackle the thorniest issues rather than proceed cautiously with step-by-step negotiations and interim agreements. It is also unclear how the Palestinian government would view the results of back-door talks with Israel by Abbas, who is in the opposition.

Hamas, which refuses to recognise Israel, is believed to favour a limited truce with the Jewish state in exchange for its complete withdrawal from the West Bank and east Jerusalem. Olmert is also under pressure from hardline Israelis opposed to withdrawing from the West Bank.

Meanwhile, in a rare criticism, the Bush administration said yesterday that if Israel proceeded with the building of a new settlement on the West Bank it would violate its peacemaking obligations.

David Siegel, a spokesman for the Israeli embassy, said that the planned construction would take place within the confines of an existing, 25-year-old settlement.