Region | Palestinian Territories

State with temporary border not acceptable, says Abbas

Palestinian President Abbas urged the international powers, mainly the Mideast Quartet, to take all the necessary measures to force Israel to stop its violations of international legitimacy and consensus and make it respond positively to peace commitments.

  • By Nasouh Nazzal, Correspondent
  • Published: 18:13 March 5, 2011

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas
  • Image Credit: Reuters
  • Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas takes questions during a news conference after meeting Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak in Cairo on Monday.

Ramallah: The Palestinian Authority announced on Saturday its strict rejection of all Israeli suggestions on the establishment of a Palestinian state with temporary borders.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said during a joint press conference with President of Chile Sebastian Pinera in the Palestinian Headquarters (Al Muqata'a) in Ramallah, "We have not heard about the details and nature of the project which Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will offer."

"We are aware that a project was offered in the past on a state with temporary borders," he said. "We will not accept it should it be offered once more," he said.

Abbas urged the international powers, mainly the Mideast Quartet, to take all the necessary measures to force Israel to stop its violations of international legitimacy and consensus and make it respond positively to peace commitments. "We strongly urge the Quartet to adopt all the necessary strategies to make Israel respond to peace requirements," he said.

"On the Palestinian side, we have set up all our institutions for the coming independent state, and we are working hard to end our internal division and enhance our unity," he said. "We are approaching the Palestinian public to judge the internal division where the public will have its say in presidential and parliamentary elections and choose the parties to represent them," he said.

Abbas said that the peace process has reached a serious impasse because of Israeli policies and practices including land seizure and colony activities all over the Palestinian Territories, mainly in Occupied Jerusalem. "The Israelis adopted these policies as a replacement for peace to forcefully impose a map of the final status in a unilateral way," he said. "We will never accept this," he added.

"We will always be real and permanent partners in the peace process but we rely on the efforts of freedom-loving nations," he said.

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Abbas stressed that the Palestinian people deserve to live in a free state of their own just like the rest of the nations in the world. "It is time for an independent Palestine based on 1967 border lines with East Jerusalem as its capital to join the United Nations as a full member," he said.

Chile had earlier recognised a Palestinian state but never mentioned the borders, but Abbas said that the Palestinians were happy with the recognition which Chile said was based on international legitimacy.

Pinera on his part said that his country was the first Latin American state to have deep relations with Palestine. "We strongly believe in the fair Palestinian cause and call for an independent Palestinian state which lives in peace with all its neighbours, including Israel," he said.

"Peace in the Middle East will make every single individual in the world happy, and once peace is reached between the Palestinians and Israelis, it will be a historic moment, not only for both sides but for the entire world," he added.

Pinera, who is the first president of Chile to visit Palestine, said, "It is time, however,  to end the Palestinian suffering, and Chile will play a important role in the peace process and will speak to Israeli premier Netanyahu," he said.

He stressed that Chile hosts the biggest Palestinian community outside the Arab World, and that it will go ahead in the path to peace which needs courage, determination and patience.

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