BICOM

Israel Army Radio this morning reported that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has ordered the cancellation of a scheduled meeting to advance construction plans in the West Bank, in light of the current delicate diplomatic situation.

The report says Defence Minister Moshe Ya’alon agreed to Netanyahu’s request to cancel tomorrow’s hearing of the Planning Council of the Civil Administration which is responsible for approving construction in the West Bank. Building in the Jordan Valley and other areas was apparently set to be discussed.

Although there was no official confirmation from either the Prime Minister’s Office of the Defence Ministry over the move, the report quotes an unnamed official who said, “We are making great efforts to convince the world that [Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud] Abbas is opposed to peace by embracing Hamas. It is a strong card and it would be wrong to lose it.”

Last week’s announcement that Fatah and Hamas will form a unity government prompted Israel to suspend peace talks with the PA. Netanyahu has insisted that either Abbas must change course or Hamas must reject violence and embrace peace for negotiations to resume, telling MSNBC last week, “I will be there in the future if we have a partner who is committed to peace. Right now we have a partner who has joined another partner committed to our destruction.”

Meanwhile, in a related story, the left-wing pressure group Peace Now released an advance copy of a report into settlement construction in the West Bank during the past nine months during which peace talks were taking place. Although the report claims that in this period there were 14,000 tenders and plans for construction, it records fewer than 900 actual building starts during the second half of 2013. Responding to the report, a Settlers Council spokesman rejected the Peace Now thesis of continuing construction saying, “The data is incorrect. We would be pleased if the state were building more in Judea and Samaria [West Bank].”