Palestinians pledge to restart peace talks

JERUSALEM – The moderate Palestinian leadership agreed under heavy U.S. pressure Wednesday to resume peace talks with Israel, dropping a demand that Israel first reach a truce with Islamic Hamas militants acting as spoilers.

The announcement gave Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice a modest accomplishment for a brief troubleshooting mission. It left open the question of how both sides will eventually confront Hamas militants in charge of the 1.4 million Palestinians – nearly half the population – living in the sealed-off Gaza Strip.

“The peace process is a strategic choice and we have the intention of resuming the peace process,” Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said. He did not say when talks would restart, but U.S. and other officials predicted it would be in about a week.

Rice said Abbas had assured her he will return to talks. Doing so is a political risk for Abbas, who had broken off negotiations last weekend to protest an especially deadly Israeli military incursion into Gaza. More than 120 Palestinians were killed, along with three Israelis, over a week of heightened violence.

If Israeli-Palestinian talks resume as pledged it will essentially restore the precarious balance in place since President Bush announced last fall that the two sides would resume full negotiations for the first time in seven years. The talks are supposed to frame a deal for a Palestinian state this year.

Israeli and West Bank Palestinian negotiators had been meeting regularly, and keeping their discussions secret, before Abbas pulled out. The talks had produced nothing in public, and were undermined on the one hand by continued Israeli housing activity on land the Palestinians claim and on the other by the inability of Palestinian security forces to control militants.

Earlier Wednesday, Abbas had said he would not restart negotiations until Israel declared a truce in Hamas-controlled Gaza.

Although he holds no authority in Gaza since Hamas’ violent takeover there last June, a Gaza truce could benefit Abbas. Israeli military action is so unpopular in both territories, and across the Arab world, that it undermines Abbas’ authority and makes it politically difficult for him to negotiate with Israel.

Israel and the United States fear that negotiations for a cease-fire would give Hamas a political legitimacy it does not deserve.