Posted on 11/15/2013 8:35:22 AM PST by Rusty0604
Edited on 11/15/2013 9:36:20 AM PST by Admin Moderator. [history]
(CNSNews.com) – Asserting that the United States views Jewish settlements as “illegitimate” does not amount to prejudging the outcome of negotiations aimed at resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said Thursday.
The U.S. has not recognized the legitimacy of settlements in the disputed territories “for decades,” she told a press briefing.
“Every administration in recent memory has said that the settlements are illegitimate,” Psaki added. “So it’s been a pretty consistent position for quite some time now.”
Some 520,000 Israelis – around seven percent of the total population – live in areas claimed by the Palestinians, including long-established suburbs of east, north and south Jerusalem.
Increasingly often in recent months, Secretary of State John Kerry and State Department officials have made the point about settlement illegitimacy.
Usually, they have attributed the term to “continued” settlement activity – implying active construction work in existing or new settlements. (President Obama used the same term in his 2009 speech in Cairo and again at the United Nations later that year, saying the U.S. “does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements.”)
But at a meeting with Palestinian Authority chairman Mahmoud Abbas in Bethlehem last week Kerry dropped the modifier, saying only “we consider now and have always considered the settlements to be illegitimate.”
Asked Thursday about the significance of dropping the word “continued,” Psaki said it was just “an issue of semantics.”
A reporter disagreed. “If you talk about the illegitimacy only of continued settlements, that means that you take no position on existing settlements,” said the Associated Press’ Matt Lee.
“If you have in fact dropped the word ‘continued’ from in front of ‘settlement activity,’ whether you say it’s a policy change or not it has very broad implications. It would appear as though you are toughening your stance and saying that all Israeli settlements are illegitimate
Excerpt, - See more at: CnsNews.com
This gets worse and worse. My absolute loathing for this administration has no limit and gets worse daily.
Obviously a treaty between Israel and the Palestinian Authority or the PLO, the representatives of the population per the UN, would make the distinction moot.
Valerie worked on property, mostly of the slum variety, in Chicago. She knows how to work zoning in Chicago.
Within the revolving door that is the State Department - how many of these folks give ‘speeches’ in the ME?
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