Israel moved in to uproot a Jewish settler outpost today under a US-backed "road map", the main settler organisation said.
The YESHA Council said Israeli army tractors had arrived at the Neve Erez outpost in the West Bank, northeast of Jerusalem, to begin demolishing caravans. A Defence Ministry spokeswoman had no immediate comment.
The Palestinian prime minister has said he will stand by his pledge to end anti-Israeli violence while trying to maintain a dialogue with militant Islamic groups.
At a sometimes stormy news conference in Ramallah today, Mr Mahmud Abbas refused to back down from the vows he made at last Wednesday's Middle East summit in Aqaba, Jordan, that infuriated the radical groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad.
"What I announced in Aqaba and Sharm el-Sheikh [at a US-Arab summit the day before] is the position to which we are committed and it has been fully coordinated with Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat," he said.
But Mr Abbas, newly installed in the position of Palestinian point man that Mr Arafat held for more than three decades, also sought to shore up his support, saying he would submit his Aqaba speech to the parliament.
At the Israeli-Palestinian-US summit, Mr Abbas angered Palestinian radicals by using the term "terrorism" to describe their military operations and calling for an end to the armed intifada.
Hamas, which is responsible for most anti-Israeli suicide bombings, announced it was breaking off talks with Mr Abbas.
But Mr Abbas said today he was determined to pursue ceasefire talks to end 32 months of bloodshed.
"We . . . underline our determination to pursue the dialogue with the movements which criticised us on this issue," he said. "But we are forcing no-one to take part in the ceasefire talks". A Hamas spokesman cautiously welcomed the comments.
AFP