Palestinain willing to renew peace Talks.

Authority Chairman, Mahmud Abbas stated that he is

willing to go back to negotiations with Israel, without pre-conditions, if the Arab League's monitoring committee session on May 1 approves. "Try me," he said in an exclusive

interview with Israel Channel 2 TV's Ehud Yaari. Abbas appears to have changed

direction after 15 months of stalling against US efforts to restart the talks on one

pretext or another. The US Middle East envoy, George Mitchell, who left the

Middle East announced he was returning to the region to

continue his mission , which is three days after the Arab

League meeting.
In answer to a question, Abbas said he had nothing against Binyamin Netanyahu

and is ready to talk to him. He is Israel's elected leader, said Abbas, and has a

parliamentary majority.
He stressed that certain issues had been agreed and settled in talks with Netanyahu's predecessor, Ehud Olmert and Tzipi Livni, then foreign minister. One of those issues was security in the areas to be handed over to the Palestinian state. It had been agreed

that NATO personnel under US command would be deployed in the West Bank

and along the Jordan River, he said.
Settlement blocs and territory swaps would be subject to negotiation between the

Palestinians and Israel, said Abbas, and a solution could also be found for the

Palestinian refugee problem.Asked about Palestinian Prime Minister Salam

Fayad's pledge to establish a Palestinian state by 2011, Abbas said clearly: "We are

against unilateral steps."
Regarding the future of the Gaza Strip, he said there had been good progress in the

quest for reconciliation between his Fatah movement and Hamas.
Last Friday, the Palestinian leader speaking to his Fatah party appealed to President

Barack Obama to "Impose a solution" of the Middle East conflict. He rejected out

of hand a new Israeli proposal of temporary borders for a Palestinian state on 60

percent of the West Bank.
In the meantime, the Obama administration met Israel halfway on its demand for a

construction freeze in East Jerusalem, accepting that Israel would quietly suspend

building licenses and other permits for just four weeks, giving Mitchell a chance to

persuade Abbas to joint US-moderated talks with Israel.