The Quartet of Middle East peacemakers called here Tuesday for a full respect for the truce between Israel and militants in Gaza in a statement issued after its meeting.
Israel and Palestinian militant groups signed a cease-fire last week. Peace lasted five days until Israeli targets were attacked earlier Tuesday by homemade rockets from Gaza and two Palestinian militants were killed by Israeli troops in the West Bank.
The Quartet -- the Unite Nations, the European Union, the United States and Russia -- expressed its continuing support for Egyptian efforts to restore calm to Gaza and southern Israel and urged "the calm be respected in full and expressed the hope that it would endure."
EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana said maintaining the calm will be "the most beneficial" for everyone.
The Quartet also shows its support in guaranteeing the fuel supply to Gaza and in immediate resuming stalled UN and other donor projects there.
Tuesday's statement also called on both Israelis and Palestinians to fulfill all of their obligations under the "road map" plan for peace. It urged Israel "to freeze all settlement activity" and asked for continued Palestinian efforts to fight terrorism.
It also emphasized the necessity of "more visible progress on the ground" to build confidence and push forward the ongoing negotiations toward Middle East peace.
The meeting of Quartet followed the international conference in Berlin on Tuesday which have pledged 242 million U.S. dollars to help Palestinians build well-functioning security and justice systems.
The Berlin conference was attended by representatives from more than 40 countries including Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad, Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.
Source:Xinhua
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