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Welcome to Palestine Today, a service of the International Middle East Media Center, www.imemc.org, for Tuesday, October 8, 2013.
Palestinian Israeli negotiators meet without any progress announced, and Egyptian Authorities open Rafah crossing with Gaza. These stories, and more, coming up, stay tuned.
Palestinian and Israeli negotiators held an extended round of political talks, under American mediation, yet again, ending without achieving progress.
Tzipi Livni and Chief Israeli negotiator Yitzhak Molcho represented the Israeli side, while Chief Palestinian negotiator, Dr. Saeb Erekat, and Mohammad Eshtayya represented the Palestinian side.
While no progress was made on core issues, the two sides agreed to strengthen the American “mediation role”, as demanded by the Palestinian side. Yet, U.S Special Envoy to Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, Martin Indyk, did not participate in the meeting.
The two sides recently agreed to intensify negotiations sessions, and to hold two sessions of direct talks per week, to discuss a large array of issues, in an attempt to reach a peace deal.
Israeli TV, Channel 10 quoted a Palestinian official, speaking on condition of anonymity, stating that the two sides are holding extensive rounds of talks, and decided to extend the number of hours in each round to eight.
The official said that the United States has demanded Israel and the Palestinian Authority to intensify the talks, especially amidst rising serious conflicts regarding arrangements on core issues, such as borders, the refugees, and security.
In other news, the Egyptian Authorities announced on Tuesday that it will opened the Rafah crossing until next Sunday.
According to the deposed government in Gaza, the opening came after intense talks between the government and Egypt. The government announced that students and patients will talk advantage in crossing.
Since Israeli placed the Gaza Strip under total siege back in 2007, the Rafah crossing became the only way in or out of Gaza.
In July of this year, when Egypt’s army ousted the Muslim brotherhood from the government, Rafah crossing was closed and only opened for a number of humanitarian cases and students with valid visa to other countries.
And that’s all for today from the IMEMC News; this was the Tuesday, October 8, 2013 news round-up from the Occupied Palestinian Territories. For more news and updates please visit our website at www.imemc.org. Today’s report has been brought to you by George Rishmawi and me, Ghassan Bannoura.
