US urges new peace talks for Middle East

The United States urged Israel and the Palestinians to resume peace talks and to immediately focus on borders and Jerusalem, suggesting this could break their deadlock over Jewish settlement building.Talking between meetings with the Jordanian and Egyptian foreign ministers, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton made a case for Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to drop his demand for a total settlement freeze before resuming negotiations. Talks were halted a year ago over the war in the Gaza Strip and have not resumed largely because of a Palestinian demand that Israel first impose a complete freeze on building in the West Bank and East Jerusalem and Israel's refusal to do so. While repeating US concerns about Israeli construction in East Jerusalem, which the Palestinians want as the capital of a state, Clinton suggested that the only way to deal with the issue was to get into talks. The United States is making a fresh push to resolve the six-decade conflict, which U.S. officials believe destabilizes the region and fuels anti-American sentiment around the world.