Border deal is crucial in Mideast plan

Associated Press

JERUSALEM

Washington’s new proposal for reviving Mideast talks, presented Sunday to Israel’s Cabinet, rests on the bold expectation that Israelis and Palestinians will be able to sketch a border between them in three months. That’s the period the plan sets aside for a one-time extension of a ban on new construction in West Bank settlements.

The proposal was worked out in a seven-hour meeting last week in New York between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton. U.S. officials said Netanyahu told the administration that he supports the plan and will try to win approval from his Cabinet.

But 90 days seems to be very short time to achieve what Israeli and Palestinian negotiators have failed to do in nearly two decades of intermittent talks, particularly since the current gaps between Netanyahu and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas are much wider than those in previous rounds.

The “borders first” approach could help defuse the dispute over Israeli settlement expansion on war-won land.