Israel and the Palestinians Friday resumed high-level talks after a two-week hiatus, meeting with a top US envoy amid mounting US criticism of settlement construction. US displeasure with the continued Jewish settlement activity in the occupied West Bank was stressed during the three-hour talks, an official close to the Israeli delegation said. The meeting, to discuss implementation of the stalled 2003 peace roadmap, was the first at senior level since Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas suspended talks on March 2 to protest an Israeli blitz on the Hamas-run Gaza Strip. “We examined areas where the parties are not meeting their commitments and the reasons why, and explored ways to accelerate the process and make the parties' implementation of their roadmap obligations more effective,” the US embassy said. “Our goal remains the fulfillment of the parties' roadmap obligations,” added the statement, issued after the closed-door meeting at a Jerusalem hotel. Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak did not attend, but sent an aide to the talks with Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad and US Lieutenant General William Fraser, who was appointed in January to oversee compliance with the roadmap. The US side described the talks as “cordial but frank.” On the eve of the talks, Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni admitted during a US visit that settlement construction was unhelpful to the peace process. “Basically, I don't think that it helps,” she said in a speech at Harvard University. “Israel is not living up to its commitments to do what it can to facilitate the lives of the Palestinians in the West Bank,” a diplomat familiar with the talks said. Drafted by the United States, the European Union, Russia and the United Nations, the roadmap calls for a halt to Jewish settlement activity in Palestinian territories and an end to Palestinian attacks against Israel. The plan has made scant progress, but Israel and the Palestinians agreed in November to relaunch it during a conference in the United States that restarted the peace process after a seven
