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Obama presses Israel, Palestinians on West Bank
(Agencies)
Updated: 2009-05-29 15:47

Asked about his impression of the meeting with Obama, Abbas said: "It was a serious and open meeting and President Obama seems determined on what he has said to us and to Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu about the necessity of implementing the road map, and we have agreed to continue our communications."

Obama presses Israel, Palestinians on West Bank
US President Barack Obama and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas shake hands during their meeting in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington May 28, 2009. [Agencies]

Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said Obama affirmed to Abbas that Israel has an obligation to freeze settlement expansions, including natural growth.

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The US and much of the world consider the settlements an obstacle to peace because they are built on captured land the Palestinians claim for a future state. But successive US administrations have done little to halt settlement activity.

Now more than 120 settlements dot the West Bank, and Palestinian officials say their growth makes it increasingly impossible to realize their dream of independence.

More than 280,000 Israelis live in the settlements, in addition to more than 2 million Palestinians in the West Bank. An additional 180,000 Israelis live in east Jerusalem, where the Palestinians hope to establish their capital.

Israelis will be anxiously watching Obama's June 4 speech in Cairo, where he will deliver a message to the Muslim world to try to repair relations that frayed badly under the Bush administration. Obama will also visit Saudi Arabia before he goes to Egypt.

"I want to use the occasion to deliver a broader message about how the United States can change for the better its relationship with the Muslim world," Obama said of his Egypt speech.

"That will require, I think, a recognition on both the part of the United States as well as many majority Muslim countries about each other, a better sense of understanding, and I think possibilities to achieve common ground."

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