Region

DUBAI — Just 4 per cent of emergency work in Syria for Palestinians has been funded so far this year, threatening the viability of a cash assistance programme that UNRWA spokesman Christopher Gunness described on Sunday as a "lifeline" for refugees.

He said the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) needs around $415 million, of which $250 million would fund its cash programme — which provides cash distributions for roughly half a million Palestinian refugees affected by the war in Syria.

Gunness spoke to The Associated Press from Kuwait, where an international conference will take place Tuesday to raise funds for humanitarian operations in Syria.

"We're not crying wolf here. If we don't receive the funds for this program at this conference in Kuwait we are going to have to cease in a matter of days our vital cash assistance program," he said.

"It will be devastating," he added. "This is literally a lifeline. It is quite literally a matter of life and death."

More than 95 per cent of Palestinian refugees from Syria rely on UNRWA assistance, particularly the cash distributions due to high unemployment caused by the Syrian civil war, now in its fifth year. The agency's relief reaches some 475,000 Palestinian refugees still residing in Syria, with another 45,000 in Lebanon and 15,000 in Jordan where many have fled.

Gunness said that last year, its emergency budget of $417 million was only 52 per cent funded. As a result, the agency had to slash its rounds of cash distribution in half and beneficiaries received just $16 per month, or around 60 cents a day.

At last year's donors' conference in Kuwait, nearly 40 nations and key organisations pledged $2.4 billion for overall needs in Syria. But $585 million had not been paid, according to information released in November by the UN humanitarian office's Financial Tracking Service.

In December, the World Food Programme was forced to launch a social media campaign to raise money from people online after an electronic food voucher programme for Syrian refugees was suspended because many donors failed to meet their commitments.

LAUSANNE, Switzerland — Iran and six world powers tried to break an impasse in nuclear negotiations on Sunday, but officials cautioned that attempts to reach a preliminary deal by a deadline in two days could yet fall apart.

The two sides explored compromises in areas including numbers of centrifuges used to enrich uranium that Iran could operate, and its nuclear enrichment work for medical research.

But Israel, which feels especially threatened by the possibility of a nuclear-armed Iran, said the details of a possible framework agreement emerging from the talks in the Swiss city of Lausanne were even worse than it feared.

The six powers — the United States, Britain, France, Germany, Russia and China — want at least a 10-year suspension of Iran's most sensitive nuclear work. Tehran, which denies it trying to develop a nuclear weapons capability, is demanding an end to international sanctions that are crippling its economy.

Officials warned that deep disagreements remained over several sticking points in Lausanne. Nevertheless, they said that in recent days the two sides have been closing in on a preliminary deal that could be summarised in a brief document of several pages that may or may not be released.

Several officials told Reuters that Tehran had indicated a willingness to cut the number of centrifuges it uses to fewer than 6,000, thereby slowing its programme, and to send most of its enriched uranium stockpiles for storage in Russia.

Western powers, on the other hand, were considering the idea of allowing Iran to conduct limited, closely-monitored enrichment-related work for medical purposes at an underground facility, the officials added on condition of anonymity.

Iran had originally insisted on keeping in operation the nearly 10,000 centrifuges it currently uses, but said in November that Washington indicated it could accept around 6,000. Iranian officials say they had been pushing for 6,500-7,000.

All parts of an emerging nuclear deal are interrelated. "Everything could still fall apart," a Western official told Reuters, adding that the talks could drag on to Tuesday, the self-imposed deadline for a framework agreement.

Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi also said the outcome was uncertain. "All sides are working hard to resolve remaining issues but there is still a long way to go," he told reporters.

German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier warned that the stakes were high. "I can't rule out that there will be further crises in these negotiations," he told reporters.

A main sticking point is Iran's demand that it continue with research into a new generation of advanced centrifuges. These machines can purify uranium faster and in greater quantities for use in nuclear power plants or, if very highly enriched, in weapons.

Another question is over the speed of removing United Nations sanctions on Iran. A senior US official said there were unresolved questions on other issues but expected those would fall into place if the big sticking points could be worked out.

The US official added that the negotiators were working towards something that would be called an "understanding", as opposed to a formal agreement.

Such a deal would form the basis of a comprehensive deal, including all technical details, to be tied up by June 30.

The powers' aim is to ensure that Iran is kept at least one year away from the ability to produce enough fissile nuclear material for a single weapon for at least 10 years.

Israel furious

"We're hopeful, but there is still a lot of work to be done," French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius told reporters on Sunday. His remarks contrasted to hostility from Israel, which is believed to have the Middle East's only nuclear arsenal but is not a party to the talks.

"This deal, as it appears to be emerging, bears out all of our fears, and even more than that," Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told his Cabinet in Jerusalem.

Netanyahu referred to advances made by Houthi rebels allied to Tehran in Yemen, and accused the Islamic republic of trying to "conquer the entire Middle East".

"The Iran-Lausanne-Yemen axis is very dangerous to humanity, and must be stopped," he said.

In the past, Israel has threatened to attack Iran if it is not happy with an eventual deal and has long described France as the negotiating power with a position closest to its own, a view confirmed by officials close to the talks.

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, who met Fabius in Lausanne on Sunday, said there was now positive momentum towards a comprehensive agreement. However, "some outstanding differences remain obstacles in the negotiation process," his ministry quoted him as saying.

Fabius, Steinmeier and US Secretary of State John Kerry have all canceled travel plans so they could remain in Lausanne to continue the talks at a ministerial level. If there is a deal, the talks may shift to Geneva for the announcement.

Their Russian and British counterparts are expected in Lausanne soon.

BAGHDAD — Retaking the city of Tikrit, where Daesh militants have rigged streets and buildings with explosives, will require "major sacrifices" on the part of Iraqi forces, a senior intelligence officer said Saturday.

Iraqi forces and allied paramilitaries have been fighting to retake the city since March 2, but halted ground operations for more than a week in what officials described as a bid to curb human and material losses before pushing forward again.

"The task of liberating Tikrit requires major sacrifices and street fighting, and our forces are ready for these sacrifices," the officer told AFP on condition of anonymity, indicating that the pause in operations only deferred the inevitable cost.

Daesh terror group has planted bombs in streets, rigged houses and other buildings with explosives, and built defensive works including berms and tunnels, also booby-traps, the officer said.

Daesh spearheaded a sweeping offensive last June that overran much of Iraq's Sunni Arab heartland, and the operation to retake Tikrit is Baghdad's largest to date against the militants.

A US-led anti-Daesh coalition began carrying out air strikes in the Tikrit area on Wednesday, a move that increased available firepower in the air but has at least temporarily curbed it on the ground.

Key Iranian-backed militia forces that have done much of the heavy lifting in the drive to push Daesh back suspended offensive operations after the strikes began, commanders told AFP.

The Pentagon conditioned its intervention on an enhanced role for regular government forces and Friday hailed the withdrawal of “those Shiite militias who are linked to, infiltrated by, [or] otherwise under the influence of Iran.”

Iran had been the most prominent foreign partner in the operation, but Baghdad eventually requested the US-led strikes after the drive stalled.

The battle has continued in the absence of the militia forces, with an army colonel saying there was heavy fighting on the southern outskirts of the city.

The advance was slow due to bombs planted by Daesh but security forces have gained some ground, the colonel said.

BEIRUT — Al Qaeda's Syrian affiliate and its allies seized on Saturday the city of Idlib, only the second provincial capital to be lost by the regime in more than four years of war.

The capture came as UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon expressed anger and shame at the world's failure to stop the conflict.

More than 215,000 people have been killed since anti-government protests, which erupted in March 2011, were brutally repressed by President Bashar Al Assad's regime civil war followed.

The country has been ravaged by warring factions, including jihadist groups.

The coalition that seized Idlib city is made up of Al Nusra Front, the official Syrian affiliate of Al Qaeda, and several Islamist factions.

"Al Nusra Front and its allies have captured all of Idlib," the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

"There is still a group of soldiers fighting in the security quarter of the city, but they will not be able to reverse the situation," Observatory director Rami Abdel Rahman added.

The jihadist group also announced the capture of the northwestern city on its official Twitter accounts.

"Thanks be to God, the city of Idlib has been liberated," it wrote.

The group posted photos of its fighters in front of the governorate building, the city council, a local prison and a police station in the city.

Bracing for 'terrorist' assault 

Earlier, a Syrian security source acknowledged that "terrorist groups had infiltrated the outskirts of the city," but state media did not report Idlib's fall.

Official news agency SANA said only that "army troops were regrouping south of the city of Idlib in preparation to face an influx of thousands of terrorists coming from Turkey".

The government has regularly accused Turkey, a backer of the uprising against Assad, of providing support and sanctuary to "terrorists".

The first provincial capital to fall was Raqqa, in the north, which was seized by rebels in March 2013.

The rebels were subsequently ousted by Daesh terror group, which has made Raqa the de factor Syrian capital of its self-proclaimed Islamic “caliphate” in Syria and Iraq.

The observatory said street fighting had raged through the night after the rebels entered Idlib Friday evening in an assault that began three days earlier.

Around 2,000 Al Nusra and allied fighters took part in the battle, according to the observatory, while the regime launched some 150 air strikes in a bid to hold off the attack.

At least 130 people were killed in the fighting, according to the observatory, which said some of the city’s residents had fled.

Around 200,000 people lived in the city before the conflict, but the population has swelled since with Syrians displaced from other areas.

Idlib province as a whole is a bastion of Al Nusra, which ousted several rebel groups, including Western-backed organisations, from the region in November.

That came after the group announced plans to establish an Islamic “emirate” in the area, which analysts say is intended to rival Daesh’s “caliphate”.

Idlib’s fall leaves the regime with few remaining strongholds in the province, which borders Turkey.

Government forces are still present in the cities of Jisr Al Shugur and Ariha, a few small localities, the Abu Duhur military airport and five military bases.

An aerial campaign on Yemen’s capital, launched by a Saudi-led pan-Arab force, has escalated what had in many ways been a proxy war between Iran and Saudi Arabia.

While the worsening war in Yemen shares similarities with other conflicts in the Arab world, it is the role of foreign powers in Yemen’s descent into leaderless chaos that is particularly striking.

Because Yemen is viewed as the Arab world’s poor brother — inconsequential and with little influence over the region as a whole — it serves as an avenue for the Arab world to push back against Iran. There is little other incentive for Arab governments to become involved with Yemen’s internal quagmire, other than not having a hostile government in a nation bordering the Bab Al Mandeb Strait, a highly trafficked shipping line leading to the Suez Canal.

Though Yemen’s domestic power struggle since the end of President Ali Abdullah Saleh’s reign three years ago was based largely on local grievances, these two historical foes, Shiite Iran and Sunni Saudi Arabia, worked to use who they could in Yemen for political advantage.

The Saudi kingdom long was Yemen’s largest benefactor and held sway over powerful Yemeni tribal leaders. Yet following Saleh’s resignation in November 2011, Iran swiftly worked to increase its influence in Yemen by creating ties with whomever shared a common disdain for Saudi Arabia, including liberal anti-Saleh activists.

The Houthi rebels, an oft-ignored militia from Yemen’s far north, were an obvious ally for Iran. Houthi fighters, who follow a sect of Shiite Islam known as Zaydism, consolidated power in the wake of the 2011 government collapse. They are staunchly anti-Saudi. They believe that the Kingdom was involved in the systematic corruption of their distinct Zaydi culture via the promotion of Wahhabism (a strict interpretation of Sunni Islam that began in Saudi Arabia) in the Houthis’ traditional homeland in the north.

Then last September, Houthi militia swept into Yemen’s capital, Sanaa, taking over government institutions and effectively forcing the resignation of President Abed-Rabbo Mansour Hadi — a man whose power stemmed from Western governments and the United Nations, which crafted and promulgated the transition agreement that made him president. There was no real attempt at a democratic transition in Yemen.

Hadi was propped up by the West despite his lack of leadership experience, local support and political savvy. He was far from what the pro-democracy protesters had called for in the early months of the Arab Spring. But for the international community, the theoretical alternative to ushering Hadi into power was that Saleh — who had already been president for 32 years — would have clung to power, possibly igniting a civil war. Now that has happened regardless.

Since they took the capital, Houthi militias have continued to push southward, making strategic advances along the way, like taking control of airports. On Thursday they battled pro-Hadi forces outside the port city of Aden, where Hadi had fled. The extent to which Houthis’ policy is dictated by Tehran remains unknown, but much of the Arab world believes the group is carrying out Iran’s will. Arab governments are capitalising on this ambiguity to serve their political agendas, as evidenced by their push for a military incursion into Yemen. It’s the consequence of Iran’s challenge to Saudi hegemony over Yemeni politics.

For Yemen, the consequences of foreign powers’ involvement can be dire. For one, Saudi Arabia’s actions seem to prove the proxy war narrative. And that threatens to further cement sectarian tensions, which have already been on the rise. The Shiite-Sunni rivalry — such a powerful current in today’s Middle East — was not relevant in Yemen until this past year. Followers of both sects used to pray in the same mosques. That is not the case anymore, and last week’s deadly suicide bombings in Zaydi mosques in Sanaa was a terrifying indicator of that increasing divide.

SANAA  — UN staff were evacuated from Yemen's capital Saturday after a third night of Saudi-led air strikes.

The impoverished and deeply tribal Arabian Peninsula state, on the front line of the US battle against Al Qaeda, is the scene of the latest emerging proxy struggle between Middle East powers.

A Sunni Arab coalition, led by Saudi Arabia and other Gulf monarchies, is battling to avoid having a pro-Iran regime on its doorstep, as Shiite Houthi rebels tighten the noose around President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi's southern stronghold Aden.

“I call for this operation to continue until this gang surrenders and withdraws from all locations it has occupied in every province,” Yemeni President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi told an Arab League summit in the Egyptian resort of Sharm El Sheikh (see separate story).

Hadi later flew to Saudi Arabia with King Salman and does not plan to return to Yemen until “the situation settles”, said Foreign Minister Riyad Yassin.

“The Houthis are trying to take it [Aden] by any means to impose a new reality on the ground before the summit ends,” Yassin added.

Heavy coalition strikes shook the rebel-held capital for a third consecutive night until dawn Saturday, residents said.

“It was an intense night of bombing and the windows shook,” said a foreigner working for an international aid organisation in Sanaa.

More than 200 staff from the UN, foreign embassies and other organisations were later evacuated by air, aid workers said.

The latest strikes apparently targeted mainly arms depots and other military facilities outside Sanaa, witnesses said.

Saudi Arabia says more than 10 countries have joined the coalition defending Hadi.

The Western-backed leader had gone into hiding earlier in the week as rebel forces bore down on Aden and a warplane attacked the presidential palace there.

He surfaced in Riyadh Thursday before heading to the Egypt summit.

At least 61 people have been killed and around 200 wounded in three days of fighting between Shiite rebels and anti-Houthi militia in Aden, the city’s health department director Al Kheder Lassouar said.

Nine charred bodies were pulled from an arms depot in a cave near the port city after a series of massive blasts, with the death toll expected to rise, he said.

The cause was not immediately clear but residents had been looting the arsenal of Soviet-era weapons.

The two-day Arab summit, which opened Saturday, is expected to back the offensive against the rebels and approve the creation of a joint military force to tackle extremists.

Egyptian President Abdel Fattah Al Sisi told fellow leaders the region faced “unprecedented” threats.

And Saudi King Salman vowed that the air strikes would continue until they bring “security” to the Yemeni people.

But UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon urged Arab leaders to “lay down clear guidelines to peacefully resolve the crisis in Yemen”.

Saudi warships evacuated dozens of foreign diplomats from Aden hours before the kingdom launched the air strikes on the advancing rebels, state television said on Saturday.

Saudi Arabia has vowed to do “whatever it takes” to prevent Hadi’s overthrow.

But experts say the Saudis will be reluctant to send in ground troops for fear of getting bogged down in a protracted conflict.

The Houthis are backed by army units loyal to former president Ali Abdullah Saleh, who stepped down in 2012 after a year-long popular uprising and is accused of supporting the rebels.

Saleh issued a call Friday for a ceasefire and the resumption of UN-brokered dialogue between warring parties.

Gulf diplomats said the air strikes could last up to six months and accused Iran of providing “logistical and military support” to the rebels.

LAUSANNE, Switzerland — The foreign ministers of France and Germany joined the top US and Iranian diplomats on Saturday to help break an impasse in nuclear negotiations as major powers and Iran closed in on a 2- or 3-page accord that could form the basis of a long-term deal.

The negotiations, in progress for nearly 18 months, aim to hammer out an accord whereby Iran halts sensitive nuclear work in exchange for the lifting of sanctions, with the ultimate aim of reducing the risk of a war in the Middle East.

US Secretary of State John Kerry and Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif have been in Lausanne for days to try to reach an outline agreement by a self-imposed deadline of March 31, and they held a further round of talks on Saturday.

While Tehran and the the six major powers — the United States, Britain, France, Germany, Russia and China — could clinch the preliminary framework accord in the coming days, several sticking points remain that could prevent a deal, officials close to the talks said.

"I hope we can get a robust agreement. Iran has the right to civil nuclear power, but with regard to the atomic bomb, it's 'no'," French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius told reporters on his arrival in Lausanne.

"We have moved forward on certain points, but on others not enough," he said.

Iran denies any ambition to build nuclear weapons and says its atomic programme is for purely civilian purposes.

German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier compared the talks in Lausanne to the final stage of a mountain climb.

"The endgame of the long negotiations has begun," he told Reuters. "And here, with a view of the Swiss mountains, I'm reminded that as one sees the cross on the summit the final metres are the most difficult but also the decisive ones."

Before taking an afternoon bike ride, Kerry lunched with Fabius and Steinmeier to discuss the remaining obstacles to a deal. The two European ministers were also set to meet Zarif as Western and Iranian officials familiar with the negotiations cautioned that they could still fail.

"The sides are very, very close to the final step and it could be signed or agreed and announced verbally," a senior Iranian official familiar with the talks told Reuters.

Ahead of meeting Zarif, Kerry said he expected the discussions to run late. Zarif added that the meetings would run through "evening, night, midnight, morning".

The British, Russian and the Chinese foreign ministers were due to arrive on Sunday.

If agreed, the document would cover key numbers for a comprehensive agreement between Iran and the six powers, such as the maximum number and types of uranium enrichment centrifuges Iran could operate, the size of uranium stockpiles it could maintain, the types of atomic research and development it could undertake and also details on the lifting of international sanctions that have crippled Iran's economy.

Two officials said it was likely that most of the outline agreement would be made public. Others said certain sections would be kept confidential.

Several Iranian officials denied that Iran was close to agreeing an outline document, but a Western diplomat said such comments were aimed at a domestic audience.

"The difficulty is that the Iranians are not moving enough. They like to negotiate right up to the precipice and they're very good at that," a Western diplomat said.

One key number is expected to be the duration of the agreement, which officials said would have to be in place for more than 10 years. Once it expired, there would probably be a period of special UN  monitoring of Tehran's nuclear programme.

The framework accord should be followed by a comprehensive deal by June 30 that includes full technical details on the limits set for Iran's sensitive nuclear activities.

MOGADISHU — A hotel siege by Al Shabab militants in the Somali capital has ended and the final death toll from the attack stands at 14, a senior government official said on Saturday.

Al Shabab fighters blasted and shot their way into the popular Hotel Maka Al Mukaram on Friday afternoon, trapping many government officials.

Security personnel, led by a unit from the elite US-trained special forces troops known as "Gaashaan" (Shield) stormed the hotel on Friday evening and fought the attackers into Saturday.

Mohamed Abdi, information minister, said the 14 dead included Somalia's ambassador to Geneva, five civilians, four hotel guards and four government soldiers. Four attackers, including one who detonated a car bomb, were also killed.

"The hotel operation is over and these are the dead bodies of the militants who wanted to slaughter our people. Thanks to our forces who saved our people in the hotel," he said at the scene while displaying the militants' bodies to reporters.

Police had previously put the number of dead at 15, and 20 wounded.

African peacekeeping forces pushed Al Qaeda-linked Al Shabab out of Mogadishu in 2011, but it has kept up guerrilla-style attacks, looking to overthrow the government and impose its strict version of Sharia, or Islamic law, on the country.

The AU Mission in Somalia condemned the attack, including the killing of Somalia's representative to the United Nations Office in Geneva, Yusuf Bari-Bari.

"Our message to the perpetrators of this inhuman act is that their action will not dampen our spirit for the common good of Somalia," it said in a statement.

Sheikh Ali Mahamud Rage, Al Shabab's spokesman, said in an e-mailed statement that fighters who had survived the attack had left the hotel, and he threatened more violence. He did not say how many people had been involved in the attack.

Abdiasis Abu Musab, al Shabaab's military operations spokesman, said they had targeted only government officials and had spared civilians.

Earlier on Saturday journalists and paramedics had been barred from entering the hotel grounds and had only been allowed to watch from its gate.

Streets surrounding the hotel were sealed off by government and African Union peacekeeping troops.

An offensive launched last year by AU forces along with the Somali army has driven Al Shabab from its strongholds in central and southern Somalia, while a series of US drone strikes have killed some of its top leaders.

In February, Al Shabab fighters attacked another hotel in Mogadishu, killing at least 25.

OCCUPIED JERUSALEM — Israel said Friday it would be releasing to the Palestinian Authority tax funds it had been withholding as punishment, as diplomatic pressures on Israel were coming to a head.

The move could help to preempt imminent Palestinian diplomatic measures against Israel, as well as disarm tensions with the United States and international community after a polarising Israeli election campaign.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office said revenues accumulated over three months, frozen by Israel since January in retaliation for a Palestinian move to join the International Criminal Court (ICC), would be transferred after normal deductions for services.

But it did not say whether Israel would resume the normal monthly payment of around $127 million (118 million euros) in customs duties levied on goods destined for Palestinian markets that transit through Israeli ports.

A spokesman for Netanyahu, contacted by AFP, would not say.

The Palestinians reacted with caution.

"Until now we haven't received any money, nor have we officially been informed of anything," Palestinian Authority spokesman Ihab Bseiso said. "We will wait to be informed officially; currently we are only hearing about this through the media."

The decision comes 10 days after Netanyahu was reelected and subsequently chosen to form the next government following a campaign in which he pledged to continue settlement activity and prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state, which exacerbated diplomatic tensions with Washington.

Netanyahu later back-tracked on remarks opposing a two-state solution, while plans for construction in East Jerusalem — which the Palestinians want as the capital of a future state — were put on hold.

The Israeli decision will help to sustain the Palestinian Authority, facing financial collapse without tax revenues that constitute some two-thirds of its annual budget, excluding foreign aid.

The move to release the funds took into consideration "humanitarian concerns" and "an overview of Israel's interests at this time”, the Israeli statement read.

"Given the deteriorating situation in the Middle East, one must act responsibly and with due consideration alongside a determined struggle against extremist elements," Netanyahu was quoted as saying.

On Wednesday, the Palestinians will formally become members of the ICC and can proceed with legal action there against Israeli officials.

They have said they intended to pursue Israeli war crimes allegedly committed during last summer's war in the Gaza Strip, as well as Israel's policy of building settlements on occupied Palestinian lands.

A Palestinian state living side by side with Israel in peace is the international community's vision for an end to the decades-long conflict.

The White House recently said it may withdraw crucial diplomatic cover for Israel at the UN Security Council as it reevaluates its position. Such a move could prove problematic for Israel if the Palestinians resubmit a draft resolution setting an end date for the Israeli occupation.

UNITED NATIONS — France will soon begin talks at the United Nations on a new Security Council resolution to revive Israeli-Palestinian peace prospects, Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said Friday.

Fabius told reporters at UN headquarters in New York that discussions on a text would start "in the coming days”.

The Security Council in December rejected a resolution that would have set a deadline for reaching a final peace deal and pave the way to the creation of a Palestinian state.

The United States had voted against the measure but was spared from resorting to its veto after eight council members including France voted yes, one vote short of the nine needed for adoption.

"I hope the partners that were reluctant will be less reluctant," Fabius said.

"It is necessary to move forward to have a solution to this problem," he added.

The United States offered a cautious reaction to the French plan.

"We're not going to get ahead of any decisions about what the United States would do with regard to potential action at the UN Security Council," a US official told AFP.

"We continue to engage with key stakeholders, including the French, to find a way forward that advances the interest we and others share in a two-state solution," said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

The French move came a day after UN envoy Robert Serry told the Security Council that it should step in to present a "framework for negotiations, including parameters" to achieve peace.

"This may be the only way to preserve the goal of a two-state solution, in the present circumstances," he said in a bluntly worded assessment of the Israeli-Palestinian crisis.

International concern over the fate of the peace process spiked after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed during his election campaign that he would never allow the establishment of a Palestinian state under his watch.

Netanyahu later backtracked on his comments but the US administration appeared unconvinced and UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon urged him to renew his commitment to a two-state solution.

Fabius stressed that a UN draft resolution could be presented to the 15-member council "in the coming weeks”.

Serry warned that a new UN resolution to re-launch negotiations would be fruitless without a genuine commitment from both sides to reach a deal.

"If the parties are not ready to negotiate it would be wrong to rush them," he said.

But Fabius stressed that UN action could help nudge the two sides back to the negotiating table.

"Obviously the two parties must discuss, but the discussion must be backed by an international effort," he said.

Israel has long maintained that direct talks with the Palestinians are the best framework for advancing peace talks and has bristled at UN involvement to set a timeframe for a deal.