Azerbaijan, Baku, September 22 / Trend , U.Sadikhova /
The Palestinian Administration has agreed upon meeting of President Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in New York because it does not want to be responsible for the failure of the peace process, said Adil Attiya, deputy head of the Palestinian delegation to the EU.
"President [Mahmoud Abbas] does not want the USA to put responsibility for ending the peace process on him," Attiya told Trend by telephone.
He said that the government of the Palestinian Autonomy does not want the U.S. Administration to blame it for the failure of American efforts to advance the peace process in the Middle East.
On Sept. 22, New York hosts the first summit of the Palestinian and Israeli leaders, held on the initiative of U.S. President Barack Obama, BBC reported.
The Forum's agenda includes the prospects for resuming peace process in the Middle East.
This will be the first official meeting of the head of the Palestinian Autonomy Abbas with Netanyahu after a new government came to power in Israel in February.
However, Attiya said that the Palestinian leadership does not consider this meeting as the resumption of peace negotiations, because Israel did not put on the agenda the issue of stopping the construction of Jewish settlements.
The meeting is the result of Obama's pressure on the Palestinian leadership, said Attiya, adding that Palestinians do not expect anything from the meeting.
The stumbling block in the peace negotiations between the Palestinians and the Israelis, which were stopped six months ago, is the refusal of Israel to stop settlement activity on the West Bank of Jordan River and East Jerusalem, of which status is one of the main points in the peace agreement.
White House spokesman Robert Gibbs told reporters that the U.S. does not have high expectations for this meeting, the main thing is to continue the negotiation process.
In the past, Netanyahu offered to freeze the program on expansion of Jewish settlements within nine months, but the proposal excluded the territory of East Jerusalem, as well as the already approved projects for construction of houses, BBC website reported.
Before leaving for New York, Netanyahu confirmed that his position remains unchanged.