UAE to build town for Palestinians at site of Gaza settlements

The United Arab Emirates is to build a new town for Palestinians on the site of demolished Jewish settlements once Israel withdraws from the Gaza Strip, state news agency WAM said on Sunday.

It said the development, to be named the Khalifa bin Zayed City after UAE President Sheikh Khalifa, would house 30,000 to 40,000 Palestinians at a cost of at least $100 million.

It was not clear where the town would be built.

Israel has said that next month it will begin the removal of 21 settlements in Gaza, which Israel has occupied since the 1967 Six-Day War.

A new neighborhood opened in the northern Gaza Strip earlier this year where the UAE spent some $55 million to house Palestinians whose homes had been destroyed by the Israel Defense Forces since 2000.

Israel has agreed with the Palestinian Authority to demolish all the homes in its Gaza enclaves.

The UAE, an affluent trade and tourism hub in the Gulf, has no diplomatic relations with Israel and links formal ties to the establishment of a Palestinian state alongside Israel.

Karzai: Relations with Israel possibleAfghan President Hamid Karzai believes progress in the Middle East peace process and Palestinian statehood could augur possible diplomatic relations between Israel and Afghanistan, a newspaper on Sunday quoted him as saying.

"At this stage we do not have relations of any kind with Israel. But let us wait and see what happens in the future. The more the peace process moves forward, the more a new era of possibilities will be created in the area, especially as our Palestinian brothers see a brighter future, as a state and a nation, Afghanistan can weigh relations with Israel," Karzai reportedly told a reporter from the Maariv daily following a lecture in Rome.

Karzai was in the Italian capital as part of a European trip focused on Afghanistan's economic development and other issues.

Israel has diplomatic relations with 163 states, an increase of 71 since the convening of the Madrid Peace Conference in 1991, but no official diplomatic ties with Afghanistan. Maariv quoted Karzai as saying his country was interested in a Middle East peace that would include "the rights of all the sides, peace that takes into account the rights of the Palestinians, and peace that will include the rights of the Israelis."

"I personally hope for peace in this part of the world," Karzai was quoted as saying. "I hope for peace that will keep both peoples happy. Loss of life, whether you are talking about Israelis, Palestinians, Jews or Muslims is terrible. Everyone is a human being," he said.

In Jerusalem, Foreign Ministry spokesman Mark Regev said Israel hoped it could have "normal and correct diplomatic relations with all countries in the Asian continent" and saw "no reason why such relations couldn't develop."

"We have good relations with many Asian countries and we hope it will not be long before the remainder also establish diplomatic relations with Israel," Regev said.