Middle East Quartet 'is failing'

25/09/2008| IslamWeb

Aid agencies have accused the Middle East Quartet of failing in its mission and urged it to increase its efforts.

 

In a report, the agencies said the Quartet - which comprises Russia, the US, the EU and the UN - had failed to make progress on a number of fronts.

 

The report was issued ahead of a Quartet meeting in New York on Friday.

 

The Bush administration has been seeking a peace deal between Israelis and Palestinians by year-end but this is looking increasingly unlikely.

 

'Deterioration'

 

The coalition of 21 prominent aid agencies, including Oxfam and Save the Children, said the Quartet had fundamentally failed in its mission.

 

It warned that the Middle East peace process would fall apart unless the group made swift and dramatic progress towards the goals it had set itself.

 

The report said that there was no change and even marked deterioration on several of the main objectives set by the Quartet to help improve the daily lives of the Palestinians.

 

This included securing the removal of Israeli checkpoints, halting the growth of Israeli settlements on occupied Palestinian land and addressing the isolation of the Gaza strip.

 

The Quartet had failed to hold Israel to account for expanding the settlements, the report added.

 

The White House has been trying to help bring about a peace deal between the Israelis and the Palestinians by the end of the year.

 

But this is looking increasingly unlikely and while Washington insists there is progress on the ground, ordinary Palestinians have yet to feel a real difference in their lives.

 

PHOTO CAPTION

 

A laborer works in Maale Adumin, the largest Jewish settlement in the West Bank, on 27 August 2008.

 

Source: BBC