The New Nation - Internet Edition

AP, Ramallah

The Palestinians should give up seeking an independent state and pursue a single country in which they would enjoy equal rights with Israelis, the chief Palestinian negotiator in Mideast peace talks said Wednesday.

The remark by Saeb Erekat was not a novel idea - prominent Palestinians, including past negotiators, have floated it before, usually when efforts to achieve a negotiated solution to the decades old-conflict with Israel are faltering as they are now. Barack Obama's push to restart the peace talks has faltered, largely due to disagreements over further construction of Israeli settlements in east Jerusalem and the West Bank, lands the Palestinians want for their hoped-for state. Some 500,000 Israelis now live in the West Bank and east Jerusalem in settlements built by Israel since capturing the territories in 1967. Israel promised to halt all settlement activity in a 2003 peace plan, but construction has never stopped.

Israel has rebuffed calls from the Obama administration to freeze all settlement construction, instead offering to limit it in the West Bank while retaining the right to continue building in Jerusalem.