John Kerry To Present Possible Middle East Deal

John Kerry To Present Possible Middle East Deal In Israel Visit

United States Secretary of State John Kerry will present a basic outline of a final version of the Middle East peace agreement during his future visit to Israel scheduled for this week. Spokeswoman Marie Harf said that Kerry will discuss with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas about what a framework to address all basic issues between the two belligerent sides should look like.

The core issues that the proposed deal would address are the border between Israel and a future state of Palestine, the way in which Palestinian refugees would be handled, major security issues in the area and claims to the city of Jerusalem.

Both sides have resumed peace talks this July after heavy pressure was expressed by the United States through its secretary of State John Kerry. As a precondition for peace talks, the Palestinian side dropped demands for the stopping of new Jewish settlement construction while Israel agreed to release 104 Palestinian prisoners that have been detained for years.

Kerry who will be leaving for the Middle East on New Year’s Day is under a predetermined schedule of reaching a deal within nine months, with the target date expiring in April 2014. While the deadline doesn't mean that talks will end there, it does intend to create some tangible progress in a process that has registered little of it so far.

Posted by James Fried on Thursday January 02 2014, 7:29 AM EDT. Ref: USA Today. Link. All trademarks acknowledged. Filed under Featured News, World. Comments and Trackbacks closed. Follow responses: RSS 2.0