Palestinian official: Israel meddled in US elections

RAMALLAH - A senior Palestinian official accused Israel on Wednesday of having sought to manipulate US

'US interests will not change'

Abed Rabbo accuses Israel of manipulating US mid-term elections to further hamper stalled Mideast peace talks.

mid-term elections to further hamper stalled Middle East peace talks.

"It seems that the right-wing Israeli government colluded with powers inside the United States for political manoeuvres and games," Yasser Abed Rabbo, the secretary general of the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) said.

It did so "in the hope that the results of the American elections would lead to a total stalemate of the political process or steer it in a direction that suits its interests," he said in remarks carried by an official Palestinian radio station.

"This reveals once again that there is an Israeli government that wants to use every means to cast off the peace process," added Abed Rabbo, who is a top aide to president Mahmud Abbas and a member of his negotiating team.

An Israeli official declined to comment publicly on the remarks, but said "talk of collusion and conspiracy is to be expected from groups like Hamas and Hezbollah but is not something we should be hearing from the PLO leadership."

Abed Rabbo's remarks came as Republicans won control of the House of Representatives from the Democratic party of US President Barack Obama, who has struggled over the past two years to relaunch the peace process.

The US State Department had said ahead of the vote that it would have little impact on Middle East policy, noting that the pursuit of a comprehensive peace was a "significant national interest" with bipartisan support.

However, Republicans have been critical of the Obama administration's efforts to pressure Israel to freeze settlements in line with Palestinian demands that all building in the occupied territories stop ahead of new talks.

Abed Rabbo downplayed the impact of the elections on US foreign policy, saying US interests would not change.

"We are not connected to the results of the elections in the United States... They have political importance but not on the general strategy of the US administration," he said.

Obama convinced Israel and the Palestinians to relaunch direct peace talks on September 2 after a 20-month hiatus but the negotiations ground to a halt later that month when a partial moratorium on settlement construction expired.

The Palestinians have said they will not renew the talks without a complete freeze, while Israel has said the issue of settlements should be addressed alongside other core disputes in the decades-old conflict.