JERUSALEM, March 26: US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has added fuel to the debate over the future of Jewish settlements in the West Bank, saying in an interview published on Saturday that the details of Israel’s peace plan obligations to a “settlement freeze” were still being studied. Her remarks, in an interview with the Washington Post, came a day after she was quoted by the Los Angeles Times as criticizing Israel for plans to expand one such settlement, saying that went against US policy and could harm peace efforts. They also came a day after the US ambassador to Israel, Dan Kurtzer, insisted that “US policy is the support that the president has given for the retention by Israel of the major Israeli population centres as an outcome of negotiations”. The ambassador was responding to a report in the top-selling Yediot Aharonot daily which quoted him as saying Washington had not made any such promise to Israel.

The paper said Mr Kurtzer “refuted” a much-repeated Israeli claim that there is an “understanding” with Washington that in a comprehensive future agreement with the Palestinians, Israel would retain sovereignty over large settlement blocs.

But in the Los Angeles Times interview, Condoleezza Rice criticized Israel over its plans to build 3,500 extra housing units in Maale Adumim.

She said those plans, revealed earlier this week, were “at odds with American policy” and that the Israeli explanations were “not really a satisfactory response”.

In her remarks to the Post, she said the only US “commitment or assurance” in the April 14 letter was that the final borders of a promised Palestinian state must take into account demographic realities on the ground.

Those realities included existing major Israeli populations centres in the West Bank, she said.

Ms Rice said there was no US support for new building within settlements, but swiftly added that the meaning of “settlement freeze” required of Israel under the internationally drafted roadmap peace plan of 2003 was still up for discussion.—AFP