EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini stressed the need to revive peace talks between Israelis and Palestinians.

"Let us not wait for the next open war between the Israelis and the Palestinians - because this is what will happen, if they don’t go back now to meaningful negotiations," she told Monday the United Nations (UN) Security Council in New York.

Mogherini, in New York for a Council briefing on cooperation between the UN and regional organisations but also to address the annual American Jewish Committee (AJC) Global Forum, said ‘’the proliferation of conflicts and crises in the region is not a reason to forget about the fate of the Israelis and the Palestinians.’’

‘’On the contrary, the new security threats in the Middle East should push everyone to renew our efforts towards ending this conflict,” she added.

Mogherini said the entire Middle East region would benefit from peace between Israel and and the Palestinian.

She called for violence and incitement to stop but at the same time she warned that Israel’s settlement policy ‘’is systematically eroding the prospect for a viable two-state solution while the lack of unity among Palestinians is also hampering efforts at resolving the conflict.”

“Each of these trends, alone and combined, could make the two-state solution impossible to achieve. We would risk the collapse of all hope. The Israeli and Palestinian leaders hold a responsibility towards their people, the region and the world. They can halt destructive policies and rhetoric, reverse the trend, and finally rebuild the conditions for meaningful negotiations,” Mogherini said.

While acknowleding that conditions’’ are not there’’ for talks and calling the current stalemate ‘’unsustainable,’’ , she said that ‘’this is not a reason not to insist.’’ ‘’The EU will continue to work for the parties to find a way to not put two-state solution beyond reach and on the contrary, try to achieve it.”

‘’A solution to the conflict is in the interests of all the Israelis and all the Palestinians, but also all the Arabs and all the Europeans- given the security situation on the ground around Israel and Palestine,’’ she said.

The Middle East Quartet, which is composed of the US, EU, UN and Russia, is expected to release its report soon and is likely to list the obstacles Israel and the Palestinians need to overcome so as to make a return to direct talks possible.

Both in her address to the UN and to AJC, Mogherni mentioned only briefly the French-led ministerial meeting on the Middle East that took place in Paris last Friday. "We discussed how the international community can help and accompany this work,’’ she said.

She said peace cannot be imposed on the two sides. What is needed she told the AJC gathering, is a “tunnel” or “entry point” “ into negotiations, something she said was behind the Middle East Quartet report.

“We will describe very frankly, as friends do, the immediate obstacles to direct talks, and the policies that threaten the viability of a two-State solution,” she said of the report. “We believe our recommendations will be a contribution to recreate the conditions for the two sides to get back to meaningful negotiations. With some degree of confidence. With the united support of the key regional players, starting with the Arab countries and the key international players.”