PLO says Israeli bill on outposts detrimental to two-state solution

A Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) official said Tuesday that the Israeli draft bill aiming at "legalizing random settlement outposts" in the West Bank may destroy the two-state solution completely.

Ahmand Majdlani, member of the PLO Executive Committee, told Xinhua that the bill "is a very dangerous aggressive step by the right wing and extremist government in Israel."

Majdalani accused Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of "exploiting the current vacuum in the American Administration to impose new realities on the ground and destroy the two state solution completely."

He added that the bill is considered "a challenge to the international community, international law and the four Geneva Conventions, and approving it would put an end to any peaceful solution under the two state solution."

He called on the international community to move promptly to end this "racist step, if it was sincerely interested in protecting the law and its enforcement."

Majdalani urged the Palestinian leadership and the Arab states to take the settlement activity file and the draft bill to the International Criminal Court (ICC) as a "war crime."

The Israeli Knesset approved Monday night, initially, an amended draft of the bill to "legalize random outposts" in the West Bank, by 60 votes in favor and 49 against.

According to the Israeli public radio, the amended draft excluded the article that allows the enforcement of the law in retrospect on locations in which Israeli courts have already issued rulings about.

The radio station reported that the bill would compensate with land and money those who prove that Jewish settlers took away their privately owned lands.

The Knesset is expected to vote on the bill in first reading on Wednesday, despite the objection of the Attorney General of Israel Avichai Mandelblit.

UN special Middle East peace envoy Nikolay Mladenov said that the draft bill is considered a step toward annexation of the West Bank, and that the issue has long term legal consequences including the undermining the chance to achieve peace.

The issue of settlements is considered one of the most complicates issues of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and a reason for freezing peace talks between the two sides.

source:Xinhua