Quds must be capital of Palestine

Acting Palestinian Authority Chief Mahmoud Abbas says East al-Quds (Jerusalem) should be the future capital of the Palestinian state.

Abbas made the remarks on Monday in an interview broadcast by Israeli media.

The Palestinian Authority chief also stated that one of the conditions for the so-called peace talks with the Tel Aviv regime “is that East al-Quds (Jerusalem) be the capital of the Palestinian state.”

Israel should also recognize borders based on the 1967 lines which existed before the Six-Day War, when Israel captured the West Bank and East al-Quds, he added.

Asked whether he would meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Abbas said, “I am ready to meet Netanyahu any time.”

The Palestinian resistance movement Hamas, however, has described the talks as dangerous, saying that the movement would never agree to give the Israelis “one inch of the land of Palestine.”

Palestinians are seeking to create an independent state on the territories of the West Bank, East al-Quds, and the Gaza Strip.

Tel Aviv, however, has refused to return to the abovementioned borders and is unwilling to discuss the issue of al-Quds.

Meanwhile, the presence and continued expansion of Israeli settlements in occupied Palestine has created a major obstacle for the efforts to establish peace in the Middle East.

More than half a million Israelis live in over 120 illegal settlements built since Israel’s occupation of the Palestinian territories of the West Bank and East al-Quds in 1967.

Much of the international community regards the Israeli settlements as illegal because the territories were captured by Israel in a war in 1967 and are hence subject to the Geneva Conventions, which forbids construction on occupied lands.