Ammon News - AMMONNEWS - Jordan is warning that peace talks must be renewed between Israelis and Palestinians immediately.

The country's foreign minister Nasser Judeh has told Sky News the current lack of negotiations makes the chance of peace increasingly remote.

The minister also hinted Israel's future as a Jewish state may be at stake.

"The status quo is unsustainable and I think there is global agreement on that," he said.

"The absence of talks produces more facts on the ground and regresses us so that when talks start we have more issues to deal with."

Mr Judeh was speaking after a week of unrest in parts of the West Bank including the volatile city of Hebron.

American diplomats have been trying for months to restart negotiations but so far the efforts have been in vain.

The British-educated foreign minister says his government proposes fast-tracking negotiations by focusing first on borders.

"Once you identify the borders on the ground then everything on this side of the line is Palestinian and everything on the other side is Israeli."

Mr Judeh dismissed rumours that Jordan is coming under pressure from Israel and America to take responsibility for the West Bank and solving the Palestinian issue that way.

He reiterated Jordanian King Abdullah's comments on the proposal: "We have no interest in replacing an Israeli tank with a Jordanian tank."

But it was his final words that will give Israelis pause for thought.

"The two-state solution is the only solution that will guarantee comprehensive Arab Israeli peace and safety and security and stability in the region," he said.

"In the absence of that, then we have to deal with the realities on the ground."

It was a not too-thinly veiled reference to the demographic threat to Israel.

Without a two-state solution, the only alternative in the end may well be one country from the Jordan river to the Mediterranean.

With current demographic trends, that spells the eventual demise of the Jewish state.


(Sky News/ Dominic Waghorn)