Talks between Israel and the Palestinian National Authority could be frozen for a year unless the PNA abandons its demand that Israel completely stop settlement construction activity, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Tuesday.
"We must not be trapped by an illogical and unreasonable demand. It could put the peace negotiations on hold for another year," Netanyahu was quoted as saying by his press secretary.
On Monday, the Israeli head of government said Jerusalem was not even a disputed territory.
"Jerusalem is not a settlement. It's our capital," he said, hinting at the biblical sense of Jerusalem's status.
Netanyahu will meet later on Tuesday with U.S. President Barack Obama in a bid to repair ties with Washington strained over Israel's plans for new settlement construction in the Palestinian territories.
Israel's decision to build 1,600 new housing units for Jewish families in the disputed territory in East Jerusalem, announced during U.S. Vice President Joseph Biden's visit to Israel, has infuriated the U.S. as it has posed a threat to the resumption of U.S.-backed Israeli-Palestinian indirect peace talks.
Israel, which is the main recipient of U.S. foreign aid reaching $2.4 billion annually, was fast to apologize for the bad timing of its announcement, but has rejected the demand by the United States to scrap its new construction plans.
Under the internationally agreed roadmap for Middle East peace, Israel is obliged to freeze all settlement construction activity and remove unauthorized outposts built since 2001 from Palestinian territories.
WASHINGTON, March 23 (RIA Novosti)
