WEST BANK/ISRAEL: Israel's cabinet approves money transfer to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas while Israelis and Palestinians express scepticism regarding renewal of peace talks

Renewed hope for peace talks, scepticism or harsh condemnation were only a small part of a range of Israeli and Palestinian comments on Sunday (December 24), reacting to a first official meeting between Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas which took place on Saturday night (December 23). Olmert's cabinet unanimously approved the transfer of $100 million in Palestinian tax revenues to President Mahmoud Abbas's office, Israeli officials said. "I agreed in consultation with cabinet ministers to thaw a sum of money of the tax revenues being held by the Israeli government of up to 100 million dollars to provide humanitarian aid to Palestinians who are suffering as a result of their government's failed administration that isn't a part of the recognised international community," Olmert said at the start of his cabinet meeting in Jerusalem. Olmert also told ministers he had had a "good meeting" with Abbas, and that they had agreed to hold further talks and to "launch a dialogue with the Palestinian Authority" in a bid to resume peace talks stalled since 2000. Israeli Defence Minister Amir Peretz said in a visit to northern Israel that releasing of an Israeli soldier abducted by Palestinian militants on the border with Gaza in June was a key issue in negotiatins with Palesitninas. "Everyone understands that this (releasing of captured Israeli soldier) is going to be an additional breakthrough that will accelerate the whole process. Therefor I hope that all those who are involved understand it and it is about time that this crisis regarding Gilad Shalit will be resolved. We will do everything to resolve it," Peretz said aftre meeting Archbishop Elias Shakour near the town of Shefar'am. Meantime Abbas met U.S. Assistant Secretary of State David Welch at his presidential compound in the city of Ramlah, in the West Bank. PM Olmert has been under pressure from the United States and the European Union to take steps to support Abbas since he called for early Palestinian elections, a move that Hamas has rejected as a "coup" and unconstitutional. Israel and Western countries have imposed a financial boycott on the Palestinians to press Hamas to drop its refusal to recognise Israel and renounce violence. Israel had frozen nearly $500 million in Palestinians tax revenues as a part of these sanctions. Israel had frozen nearly $500 million in Palestinians tax revenues as a part of these sanctions. Palestinian lawmaker Mustafa Bargouthi said Olmert was behaving in a "condesending" way by releasing only 100$ million of freezed Palestinian tax money. "The meeting was absolutely disappointing," Barghouthi told reporters in the West Bank city of Bethlehem. "This is Palestinian money, not Israeli money and he is now wants to give 100$ million only and he wants to control how they will be spent. This is a Israelis expressed optimism on Sunday morning, saying that any political progress, even the slighless, is better than no progress at all. "I think even if there is no immediate results I think i'ts a good thing and they should meet more often," said a Tel Aviv resident. But many Palestinians were openly sceptical of the outcome of the meeting and feared it would only widen the divide between Abbas's once-dominant Fatah faction and the ruling Hamas group. "They did nothing, they didn't release the prisoners, they didn't move the check points, they just released the money," said a resident of Bethlehem. "I don't have any hope from this meeting, Israel doesn't want peace, nothing is real, they only give promises," added another. Peace talks collapsed in 2000, and a Palestinian uprising erupted soon after. Hopes of reviving the Israeli-Palestinian dialogue appeared all but dead when the Hamas Islamist movement took power in Gaza and the West Bank in March. Hamas said Israel had no right to decide how the tax money was spent, but the group did not outright oppose the money going through Abbas's office. "All the time its was just Israeli promises to the Palestinian side they are going to do such and such. But in reality they are doing nothing" said Ahmad Yousef, a political advisor to Hamas, at a press conference in Gaza.

ITN Source | December 24, 2006

Tags:. .freezed. .defence. .advisor. .abducted. .erupted