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"Israel is not sticking to its commitment to halt building in Jewish settlements, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said in an interview published Friday in an Israeli newspaper, days before U.S. President George W. Bush arrives in the region to prod Israel and the Palestinians toward a final peace deal.
It's possible that there is "no chance" a peace agreement will be reached this year as Bush hopes, Olmert told the English-language daily The Jerusalem Post. Bush has not applied any pressure on Israel to advance in the negotiations, Olmert said.
Bush is slated to visit Israel and the Palestinian territories starting Jan. 9, in his first trip to the area as president, after the sides agreed at a U.S.-sponsored conference in November to renew peace talks frozen during seven years of violence.
As part of the negotiations, Israel and the Palestinians have revived a 2003 peace plan known as the road map. Under that plan, Israel committed to halt settlement construction and dismantle unauthorized settler outposts in the West Bank, while the Palestinians pledged to crack down on anti-Israeli militants.
The plan largely foundered when each side accused the other of not fulfilling their part.
"I have announced that the state of Israel will not build new settlements and will not confiscate land for this purpose and I intend to keep the obligation," Olmert said in the interview. But he acknowledged Israel was indeed not fully upholding its part of the road map because settlement construction continued."
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