Envoys of the Quartet, made up of the European Union, Russia, the United Nations and the United States, are to meet separately in Jerusalem on Wednesday with Israeli and Palestinian representatives to seek a way to break the impasse.

"We demand that the Quartet... declare openly and clearly which party is an obstacle to the peace process," Erakat told AFP. "It is Israel which is pursuing a policy of settlement and of Judaising Jerusalem."

On September 23, after Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas submitted a request to the United Nations for Palestine to be admitted as a full member, the Quartet launched an effort to restart peace talks, which have been on hold since late September 2010.

The goal was resumption of dialogue in one month, and the conclusion of a peace agreement in one year. The one-month deadline has already passed.

On October 17, the US State Department said that Quartet envoys would talk separately with the two sides, "to begin preparations and develop an agenda for proceeding with the negotiations."

Erakat said that the envoys should "take into account the inequality between the Palestinian and Israeli sides, to apportion the responsibility for blocking the peace process."

He slammed the government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu which he said "increases Israeli settlement and rejects a serious peace process."

The Palestinians say that face-to-face talks with Israel will not resume as long as Jewish settlement in the occupied West Bank continues.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has reportedly offered to freeze government settlement construction, but the Palestinians say that represents a small portion of overall settlement building in the West Bank and east Jerusalem, and that anything short of a full freeze is unacceptable.

Referring to past comments by Abbas that he would not run again for president, Lieberman told journalists at a briefing in Jerusalem that his departure would be "a blessing," spokesman Ashley Perry told AFP.

"He's threatening to give the keys over to someone else? That's no threat, it's a blessing and I hope he finally does it," Israeli news website Ynet quoted Lieberman as saying."Any replacement would be better than him."

Perry did not have a transcript of Lieberman's remarks available but said the Ynet account was accurate.

Chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erakat protested that Lieberman's comments were part of a broader Israeli campaign to try to delegitimise Abbas.

He called on the international community "to intervene and take immediate action to stop the Israeli campaign of incitement against president Abbas and the Palestinian people."

A spokesman for UN Middle East envoy Robert Serry described Lieberman's comments as "inflammatory".

"The statement by Foreign Minister Lieberman appears to be an attempt to delegitimise president Abbas," spokesman Richard Miron told AFP.

"Such inflammatory remarks are deeply troubling and undermine trust at a time when the Quartet is working towards the resumption of negotiations," the United Nations envoy said.

Envoys of the Middle East Quartet -- made up of the EU, Russia, UN and United States -- are to meet in Jerusalem on Wednesday separately with Israeli and Palestinian officials to seek a way to break the impasse in peace talks, suspended in September 2010.

The Palestinians say face-to-face talks with Israel will not resume as long as Jewish settlement in the occupied West Bank continues.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has reportedly offered to freeze government settlement construction.

But the Palestinians say that represents a small portion of overall settlement building in the West Bank and annexed east Jerusalem, terming anything short of a full freeze as unacceptable.