Quds city (JERUSALEM), June 09 (SPA) - U.S. President Barack Obama's special Middle East envoy, George Mitchell, began a new push to facilitate Israeli-Palestinian peace talks on Tuesday by opening a series of talks with leaders in the region. U.S. President Barack Obama spoke to Israel's Netanyahu by phone on Monday and the White House said the president "reiterated the principal elements of his Cairo speech, including his commitment to Israel's security." In his address to the Muslim world in Cairo last week, Obama also called on Israel to freeze settlements. Mitchell opened his meetings in Tel Aviv with Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak and was later to travel to Jerusalem to meet Netanyahu, Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman and President Shimon Peres. He meets Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on Wednesday. "The president has told me to exert all efforts to create the circumstance when the parties can begin immediate discussions," Mitchell told reporters at a Palestinian donors' conference in Oslo, referring to renewed negotiations that President Barack Obama has pledged to pursue, according to a report of Reuters.
