PA chairman Mahmoud Abbas demanded in talks with US President Obama that Israel free the most senior Palestinian Arab prisoners, including Marwan Barghouti.

Abbas said Palestinians will not agree to extend peace talks with Israel beyond their April 29 deadline without Israel releasing more prisoners beyond the fourth and final tranche planned for later this month. He was referring to Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) leader Ahmad Saadat, former PLO finance official Fuad Shubaki and Marwan Barghouti, one of the main architects of the 2000 terror war often referred to as the Second Intifada. Saadat planned the assassination of Israeli Tourism Minister Rehavam Ze’evi in 2001. He was sentenced in 2008 to 30 years in prison. Barghouti, a senior member of Abbas’s Fatah party, is serving five life sentences for planning numerous terror attacks against Israelis.

From his jail cell, he has threatened Israel with a third intifada