Mohammed Mar'i Saudi Gazette RAMALLAH – Israel will announce a series of economic gestures to the Palestinian Authority at a meeting of donor countries, a report said on Sunday. The Hebrew daily Ma'ariv said that Israeli Intelligence and Strategic Affairs Minister Yuval Steinitz will announce the gestures during the meeting of the donor countries at the UN headquarters in New York next week. The report said that Steinitz's office refused to elaborate at this stage what will be the steps to be taken to improve the Palestinian economy. However, the report added, Steinitz's office said that the gestures will not have political significance. Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu has said several times that peace with the Palestinians must grow from economic cooperation, using the term “economic peace.” The Palestinian leadership rejected of Netanyahu's plan saying it is aimed at “diverting the world's attention from the (Palestinian) political rights.” Meanwhile, the Palestinian Authority and Israel renewed cooperation in the field of agriculture after 13 years of a freeze between them. Palestinian and Israeli sources said that Palestinian Deputy Minister of Agriculture Abdullah Lahlouh and his Israeli counterpart are to set up a bilateral center for economic-agricultural cooperation. The sources added that among the activities to be renewed after the 13 year freeze that came in the wake of the second intifada, are workshops for PA farmers provided by Israeli experts. The development comes as the US Secretary of State John Kerry arrived in Israel for one-day visit to update Netanyahu on the latest diplomatic developments regarding the Syrian crisis and the Palestinian diplomatic track. The Israeli Radio said that Kerry was accompanied by Martin Indyk, his envoy to the peace talks between Israel and the Palestinian Authority. Kerry met Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in London last week. A planned meeting with Netanyahu last week in Rome was cancelled because of the Syrian situation. Palestinian and Israeli negotiators met for the sixth round of talks since negotiations were restarted at the end of July in Washington in an attempt to solve the final status issues; Jerusalem, refugees, boundaries, settlements and security. The parties, led by chief Palestinian negotiator Sa'eb Erekat and Israeli Justice Minister Tzipi Livni, made the talks under a complete media blackout, with the Israeli side not saying where or when they will take place, or even confirming their existence. On Tuesday, chairman of the Israeli Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, Avigdor Lieberman, said that the chances of a diplomatic breakthrough between his country and the Palestinians are nil. Lieberman, former foreign minister of ruling Likud-Beiteinu party, said in an interview with Israel radio that a final status agreement with the Palestinians was “impossible” because conditions are not ripe for achieving a comprehensive peace. He added that all attempts to expedite peace talks with the Palestinian Authority were “doomed to failure.” A day earlier, the Secretary General of the Palestine Liberation Organization's Executive Committee, Yasser Abed Rabbo, said that the current peace talks between the Palestinians and Israel were unlikely to succeed. Abed Rabbo told the Voice of Palestine Radio that “the negotiations make no virtual progress on the ground and there is almost no possibility for their success.”
