Israel settlements led to peace talks impasse: Palestinians

US-sponsored peace talks with Israel have reached an impasse because of Jewish settlement activity, a Palestinian spokesman said, as plans for over 2,000 West Bank units were moved forward.
The latest crisis comes as Washington scrambles for a formula to allow the Palestinians and Israelis to carry on the peace talks beyond an April 29 deadline.
"Israel's settlement activity caused the negotiations to fail and led them to an impasse," Nabil Abu Rudeina, a spokesman for Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas, told AFP yesterday.
Abu Rudeina was reacting to the decision of an Israeli defence ministry committee, revealed earlier yesterday, to push forward with plans to build 2,269 new West Bank homes.

A ministry spokesman said last month the committee had approved the building of 1,015 units in Leshem, Beit El and Almog, leaving Defence Minister Moshe Yaalon's approval as the final step.
The same committee approved 1,254 units in Ariel, Shvut Rachel and Shavei Shomron. Those projects will be published in the media for public comment before returning to the committee for further discussion.

Israeli-Palestinian peace talks are teetering on the brink of collapse, with Washington fighting an uphill battle to get the two sides to agree to a framework proposal to extend the negotiations to the year's end.
A US State Department spokeswoman, Jennifer Psaki, said that Secretary of State John Kerry had "expressed his concerns" to Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu about recent remarks by Yaalon disparaging the United States' negotiations with Iran over its nuclear programme.

She added that, given the nearing deadline of April 29 for the Israeli-Palestinian talks, "we are not surprised that there has been an increase in rhetoric over the past couple of weeks given where we are in the process and the pivotal period. But we're just going to keep our head down and focused on the process."
So far, the Palestinians have flatly refused to consider any extension, partly over Israel's persistent settlement construction which has shown no let-up since talks resumed last July.
Israeli anti-settlement watchdog Peace Now said the planned new units would create "facts on the ground that distance us from the two-state solution".

They were further proof that Israel had "no intention to reach a peace agreement and was doing everything it could to force Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas out of the process".