The Palestinian Authority is not interested in another unilateral declaration of statehood, the PA's "Prime Minister" Salam Fayyad told Channel 2 in an interview aired Wednesday night.
"We want a state of Palestine, not a unilateral declaration of statehood," Fayyad said. He explained that he did not see how a unilateral declaration would help the PA's cause. Such a declaration "is not and will not be a part of our thinking," he added.
PA spokesmen have often threatened that they would unilaterally declare a state in 2011 if negotiations with Israel failed to yield the results they want. However, Fayyad's statement seems to indicate that the threats were empty ones.
Arab foreign ministers spoke out Wednesday against any talks between Israel and the PA, be they direct or indirect, unless the US endorses Israel's 1949 borders - the "Auschwitz Borders," as they were called by Israel's first UN ambassador, Labor's Abba Eban - as the baseline for negotiations.
Associated Press reported that the Arab diplomats, who attended an Arab League summit in Cairo, are not advocating a unilateral declaration of a PA state either.
"The negotiation track between the Palestinians and Israelis is futile. There is no return to talks. Any resumption is conditioned on a serious offer that ensures the end to the Arab-Israeli conflict based on the peace process references," a final statement from the Arab ministers said.
The ministers blamed Washington for failing to force Israel to stop building on land that was occupied by Jordan in the years 1948-1967. This failure they said, "demands that the American administration declares clearly the two states' borders be based on the [pre-]1967 borders."
Qatar's Foreign Minister Sheik Hamad bin Jassem Al Thani said in his opening statement that the Arabs "can't provide support for the return to talks, whether direct or indirect, under these circumstances." He acknowledged, however, that the Arabs had no alternative to negotiations either.
A unilateral declaration of a PA state would be tantamount to a declaration of war against Israel - a war that the Arab states and the PA are apparently not interested in at this point.