Israel will have peace if it ends Arab occupation

Israel will live in peace if it ends its occupation of Arab lands, Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas said yesterday ahead of a US-sponsored peace conference to revive the Middle East peace process.
"If there is peace between Israel and the Palestinians and the occupation of Arab lands ends, Israel will also live in a sea of peace, security and stability in the Middle East," Abbas told a joint press conference here with Israeli President Shimon Peres and his Turkish counterpart Abdullah Gul.
"If this happens, there will no longer be wars or enmity and all the peoples in the region will live in security and stability," the Palestinian leader said, speaking through a translator.
The United States is due to host an international conference in Annapolis, Maryland, in a bid to jumpstart Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations that broke down seven years ago with the second Palestinian uprising.
The conference could be held later this month, although no specific date or list of participants has been set.
Both sides have hailed the conference as an opportunity not to be missed, but negotiations to draw up a joint document for the meeting have so far failed to yield a result.
Palestinians are calling for a document that addresses core issues, while Israel prefers a looser declaration based on the 2003 roadmap plan that calls for the removal of some Jewish settlements in the West bank in exchange for Palestinians taking over responsibility for security.