Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said on Monday that the Palestinians would not accept any peace agreement with Israel, which will not give back all the occupied Palestinian territories.
Abbas told more than 200 freed Palestinian prisoners at al-Muqata'a, the headquarters of the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) "I promise you that the refugee issue will remain as one of our priorities until their suffering ends."
Abbas stressed that any future peace treaty reached with Israel should include a solution to all the permanent status key issues, mainly Jerusalem, the refugees, the borders of the future Palestinian state, and the settlements.
Israeli reports said earlier that the PNA rejected an Israeli offer to withdraw from more than 93 percent of the occupied West Bank. Israel occupied the West Bank in 1967, and completely withdrew from the Gaza Strip in 2005.
Israeli officials, for their part, refuse to allow all the Palestinian refugees living in three neighboring countries, Syria, Jordan and Lebanon, to get back into Israel, saying they should return to the future Palestinian state.
Speaking to the prisoners freed Monday morning from Israeli jails, Abbas said that Palestinian happiness would "not be complete , until Israel frees all Palestinians it holds." The PNA says there are 11 thousand prisoners in jail.
Israel freed 245 Palestinian prisoners from its prisons Monday morning as a goodwill gesture to Abbas for the Muslim Feast of Eidal-Adha. Abbas said "all prisoners should be released as soon as possible."
Source:Xinhua
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