Palestinians accuse U.S. of killing peace prospects

Oh the Never ending Diplomacy that is the Middle east peace Talks !
Now it is The United States fault that the talks will cease , Not the Ignorance of the Palestinians or even the Israeli's , bitching back and forth for how many years now ?
It is just more of the same , the Middle east will never change , Because the People who live there Don't want it to !

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JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Pointing an accusing finger at the United States, the Palestinians on Sunday said Washington's backing for Israeli refusal to halt Jewish settlement expansion had killed any hope of reviving peace negotiations soon.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, buoyed by new-found support from the Obama administration, urged the Palestinians to "get a grip" and drop their settlement freeze precondition for restarting talks suspended since December.

On a one-day Middle East visit on Saturday, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton endorsed Israel's view that settlement expansion in the occupied West Bank should not be a bar to resuming negotiations -- contradicting the Palestinian position.

Netanyahu has proposed limiting building for now to some 3,000 settler homes already approved by Israel in the West Bank. He does not regard building in occupied East Jerusalem, annexed in defiance of international opposition, as settlement.

U.S. President Barack Obama himself, after persuading Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in September to meet Netanyahu in New York, called only for "restraint" in settlement, not the "freeze" he had previously proposed.

Stung by Obama's about-face and Clinton's remarks, the Palestinians voiced their frustration.

"The negotiations are in a state of paralysis, and the result of Israel's intransigence and America's back-pedaling is that there is no hope of negotiations on the horizon," Abbas spokesman Nabil Abu Rdainah said.

He said the Palestinians were calling for the Arab League to formulate a "unified Palestinian-Arab position" on the stalled peace process.

Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said it was a "critical moment" and insisted settlement must halt to revive peace moves.

"Pressuring Palestinians to make further concessions to accommodate Israeli intransigence is not the answer," he said.