East Jerusalem must be included in a freeze of settlement activity before Middle East peace talks can restart, Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul-Gheit said Friday.
Aboul-Gheit told reporters in Stockholm that Jerusalem is Arab "and it will continue to be so." He added that the Arab world expects the area to be included in a moratorium on settlements.
The Egyptian foreign minister warned that peace talks would last only as long as a freeze on settlement construction was held in place. "If the Israelis announced that the freeze will last six months, then negotiations will last six months as well," he stressed.
US officials have denied reports that Washington has agreed to leave east Jerusalem out of the agreement and settle for a nine- to 12-month freeze in the West Bank.
Aboul-Gheit's comments came a day after NGO Ir Amim said that plans Plans to move an additional 750 Jews into Arab areas of east Jerusalem have been advanced throughout the first half of 2009.
The process of moving more Jews into such neighborhoods, where there are already about 2,000 Jewish residents, has been accelerated specifically for areas that "lie at the heart of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict," according to Ir Amim, a non-profit group that engages Israeli-Palestinian issues in the capital.
Art's Commentary.......The Arabs claim Jerusalem as their own and say that it belongs to them and not to Israel. God says otherwise in His Word, "But I have chosen Jerusalem, that my name might be there; and have chosen David to be over my people Israel," 2 Chronicles 6:6. We know from scripture that the Lord, in refering to David, was refering to the greater son of David, Christ. We read in Luke 1:32,33 about this future day when Christ will rule from Jerusalem on the throne of David. "He shall be great, and shall be called the son of the Highest; and the Lord shall give unto him the throne of his father David: And he shall reign over the house of Jacob for ever; and of his kingdom there shall be no end". Sorry Arabs, Jerusalem does not belong to you, you are playing with fire, the scripture says in Hebrews 12:29, "Our God is a consuming fire", think of Sodom and Gomorrah. To see the fate of those non Jews who claim the land of Israel and Jerusalem in the last days see Jeremiah 38-39.