A team of Swiss investigators visited the West Bank grave of late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat today to determine how best to dig up remains and extract samples ahead of their exhumation later this month, a Palestinian official said. The Swiss team, one of two groups set to conduct parallel probes into Arafat's 2004 death, spent an hour inspecting the tomb, located in a mausoleum outside Palestinian government headquarters in Ramallah. A Western diplomat, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the investigation is ongoing, said the exhumation would most likely take place Nov. 26. Tawfik Tirawi, the head of the Palestinian committee investigating the death, said the visit was meant "to check the place" ahead of the exhumation. The Swiss team is expected to return at the end of the month along with French investigators to exhume the body, and will be allowed only one chance to withdraw samples from the remains. The French and Swiss teams are acting separately on behalf of Arafat's widow Suha Arafat and the Palestinian Authority, who each had misgivings about the other's investigation. The late leader's wife and the Palestinian Authority have a history of rocky relations, and Palestinian officials have complained that they felt Suha Arafat was forcing an investigation on them. The new probes into Arafat's death come after a Swiss lab recently discovered traces of polonium-210, a deadly radioactive isotope, on clothes said to be his, which sparked new accusations that he was poisoned. Arafat's death in a French hospital in November 2004 has remained a mystery for many. While the immediate cause of death was a stroke, the underlying source of an illness he suffered in his final weeks has never been clear, leading to persistent conspiracy theories that he had cancer, AIDS or was poisoned. Many in the Arab world believe Arafat, the face of the Palestinian independence struggle for four decades, was killed by Israel. Israel, which saw Arafat as an obstacle to peace, vehemently denies the charge. There is no guarantee the exhumation will solve the mystery. Polonium-210 is known to rapidly decompose, and experts are divided over whether any remaining samples will be sufficient for testing.
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By: Amira Hass
Date: 27/05/2013
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Slain Bedouin girls' mother, a victim of Israeli-Palestinian bureaucracy
Abir Dandis, the mother of the two girls who were murdered in the Negev town of Al-Fura’a last week, couldn't find a police officer to listen to her warnings, neither in Arad nor in Ma’ale Adumim. Both police stations operate in areas where Israel wants to gather the Bedouin into permanent communities, against their will, in order to clear more land for Jewish communities. The dismissive treatment Dandis received shows how the Bedouin are considered simply to be lawbreakers by their very nature. But as a resident of the West Bank asking for help for her daughters, whose father was Israeli, Dandis faced the legal-bureaucratic maze created by the Oslo Accords. The Palestinian police is not allowed to arrest Israeli civilians. It must hand suspects over to the Israel Police. The Palestinian police complain that in cases of Israelis suspected of committing crimes against Palestinian residents, the Israel Police tend not to investigate or prosecute them. In addition, the town of Al-Azaria, where Dandis lives, is in Area B, under Palestinian civilian authority and Israeli security authority. According to the testimony of Palestinian residents, neither the IDF nor the Israel Police has any interest in internal Palestinian crime even though they have both the authority and the obligation to act in Area B. The Palestinian police are limited in what it can do in Area B. Bringing in reinforcements or carrying weapons in emergency situations requires coordination with, and obtaining permission from, the IDF. If Dandis fears that the man who murdered her daughters is going to attack her as well, she has plenty of reason to fear that she will not receive appropriate, immediate police protection from either the Israelis or the Palestinians. Dandis told Jack Khoury of Haaretz that the Ma’ale Adumim police referred her to the Palestinian Civil Affairs Coordination and Liaison Committee. Theoretically, this committee (which is subordinate to the Civil Affairs Ministry) is the logical place to go for such matters. Its parallel agency in Israel is the Civilian Liaison Committee (which is part of the Coordination and Liaison Administration - a part of the Civil Administration under the Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories). In their meetings, they are supposed to discuss matters such as settlers’ complaints about the high volume of the loudspeakers at mosques or Palestinians’ complaints about attacks by settlers. But the Palestinians see the Liaison Committee as a place to submit requests for permission to travel to Israel, and get the impression that its clerks do not have much power when faced with their Israeli counterparts. In any case, the coordination process is cumbersome and long. The Palestinian police has a family welfare unit, and activists in Palestinian women’s organizations say that in recent years, its performance has improved. But, as stated, it has no authority over Israeli civilians and residents. Several non-governmental women’s groups also operate in the West Bank and in East Jerusalem, and women in similar situations approach them for help. The manager of one such organization told Haaretz that Dandis also fell victim to this confusing duplication of procedures and laws. Had Dandis approached her, she said, she would have referred her to Adalah, the Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel, which has expertise in navigating Israel’s laws and authorities.
By: Phoebe Greenwood
Date: 27/05/2013
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John Kerry unveils plan to boost Palestinian economy
John Kerry revealed his long-awaited plan for peace in the Middle East on Sunday, hinging on a $4bn (£2.6bn) investment in the Palestinian private sector. The US secretary of state, speaking at the World Economic Forum on the Jordanian shores of the Dead Sea, told an audience including Israeli president Shimon Peres and Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas that an independent Palestinian economy is essential to achieving a sustainable peace. Speaking under the conference banner "Breaking the Impasse", Kerry announced a plan that he promised would be "bigger, bolder and more ambitious" than anything since the Oslo accords, more than 20 years ago. Tony Blair is to lead a group of private sector leaders in devising a plan to release the Palestinian economy from its dependence on international donors. The initial findings of Blair's taskforce, Kerry boasted, were "stunning", predicting a 50% increase in Palestinian GDP over three years, a cut of two-thirds in unemployment rates and almost double the Palestinian median wage. Currently, 40% of the Palestinian economy is supplied by donor aid. Kerry assured Abbas that the economic plan was not a substitute for a political solution, which remains the US's "top priority". Peres, who had taken the stage just minutes before, also issued a personal plea to his Palestinian counterpart to return to the negotiations. "Let me say to my dear friend President Abbas," Peres said, "Should we really dance around the table? Lets sit together. You'll be surprised how much can be achieved in open, direct and organised meetings."
By: Jillian Kestler-D'Amours
Date: 27/05/2013
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Isolation Devastates East Jerusalem Economy
Thick locks hug the front gates of shuttered shops, now covered in graffiti and dust from lack of use. Only a handful of customers pass along the dimly lit road, sometimes stopping to check the ripeness of fruits and vegetables, or ordering meat in near-empty butcher shops. “All the shops are closed. I’m the only one open. This used to be the best place,” said 64-year-old Mustafa Sunocret, selling vegetables out of a small storefront in the marketplace near his family’s home in the Muslim quarter of Jerusalem’s Old City. Amidst the brightly coloured scarves, clothes and carpets, ceramic pottery and religious souvenirs filling the shops of Jerusalem’s historic Old City, Palestinian merchants are struggling to keep their businesses alive. Faced with worsening health problems, Sunocret told IPS that he cannot work outside of the Old City, even as the cost of maintaining his shop, with high electricity, water and municipal tax bills to pay, weighs on him. “I only have this shop,” he said. “There is no other work. I’m tired.” Abed Ajloni, the owner of an antiques shop in the Old City, owes the Jerusalem municipality 250,000 Israeli shekels (68,300 U.S. dollars) in taxes. He told IPS that almost every day, the city’s tax collectors come into the Old City, accompanied by Israeli police and soldiers, to pressure people there to pay. “It feels like they’re coming again to occupy the city, with the soldiers and police,” Ajloni, who has owned the same shop for 35 years, told IPS. “But where can I go? What can I do? All my life I was in this place.” He added, “Does Jerusalem belong to us, or to someone else? Who’s responsible for Jerusalem? Who?” Illegal annexation Israel occupied East Jerusalem, including the Old City, in 1967. In July 1980, it passed a law stating that “Jerusalem, complete and united, is the capital of Israel”. But Israel’s annexation of East Jerusalem and subsequent application of Israeli laws over the entire city remain unrecognised by the international community. Under international law, East Jerusalem is considered occupied territory – along with the West Bank, Gaza Strip and Syrian Golan Heights – and Palestinian residents of the city are protected under the Fourth Geneva Convention. Jerusalem has historically been the economic, political and cultural centre of life for the entire Palestinian population. But after decades languishing under destructive Israeli policies meant to isolate the city from the rest of the Occupied Territories and a lack of municipal services and investment, East Jerusalem has slipped into a state of poverty and neglect. “After some 45 years of occupation, Arab Jerusalemites suffer from political and cultural schizophrenia, simultaneously connected with and isolated from their two hinterlands: Ramallah and the West Bank to their east, West Jerusalem and Israel to the west,” the International Crisis Group recently wrote. Israeli restrictions on planning and building, home demolitions, lack of investment in education and jobs, construction of an eight-foot-high separation barrier between and around Palestinian neighbourhoods and the creation of a permit system to enter Jerusalem have all contributed to the city’s isolation. Formal Palestinian political groups have also been banned from the city, and between 2001-2009, Israel closed an estimated 26 organisations, including the former Palestinian Liberation Organisation headquarters in Jerusalem, the Orient House and the Jerusalem Chamber of Commerce. Extreme poverty Israel’s policies have also led to higher prices for basic goods and services and forced many Palestinian business owners to close shop and move to Ramallah or other Palestinian neighbourhoods on the other side of the wall. Many Palestinian Jerusalemites also prefer to do their shopping in the West Bank, or in West Jerusalem, where prices are lower. While Palestinians constitute 39 percent of the city’s population today, almost 80 percent of East Jerusalem residents, including 85 percent of children, live below the poverty line. “How could you develop [an] economy if you don’t control your resources? How could you develop [an] economy if you don’t have any control of your borders?” said Zakaria Odeh, director of the Civic Coalition for Palestinian Rights in Jerusalem, of “this kind of fragmentation, checkpoints, closure”. “Without freedom of movement of goods and human beings, how could you develop an economy?” he asked. “You can’t talk about independent economy in Jerusalem or the West Bank or in all of Palestine without a political solution. We don’t have a Palestinian economy; we have economic activities. That’s all we have,” Odeh told IPS. Israel’s separation barrier alone, according to a new report by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTD), has caused a direct loss of over one billion dollars to Palestinians in Jerusalem, and continues to incur 200 million dollars per year in lost opportunities. Israel’s severing and control over the Jerusalem-Jericho road – the historical trade route that connected Jerusalem to the rest of the West Bank and Middle East – has also contributed to the city’s economic downturn. Separation of Jerusalem from West Bank Before the First Intifada (Arabic for “uprising”) began in the late 1980s, East Jerusalem contributed approximately 14 to 15 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP) in the Occupied Palestinian territories (OPT). By 2000, that number had dropped to less than eight percent; in 2010, the East Jerusalem economy, compared to the rest of the OPT, was estimated at only seven percent. “Economic separation resulted in the contraction in the relative size of the East Jerusalem economy, its detachment from the remaining OPT and the gradual redirection of East Jerusalem employment towards the Israeli labour market,” the U.N. report found. Decades ago, Israel adopted a policy to maintain a so-called “demographic balance” in Jerusalem and attempt to limit Palestinian residents of the city to 26.5 percent or less of the total population. To maintain this composition, Israel built numerous Jewish-Israeli settlements inside and in a ring around Jerusalem and changed the municipal boundaries to encompass Jewish neighbourhoods while excluding Palestinian ones. It is now estimated that 90,000 Palestinians holding Jerusalem residency rights live on the other side of the separation barrier and must cross through Israeli checkpoints in order to reach Jerusalem for school, medical treatment, work, and other services. “Israel is using all kinds of tools to push the Palestinians to leave; sometimes they are visible, and sometimes invisible tools,” explained Ziad al-Hammouri, director of the Jerusalem Centre for Social and Economic Rights (JCSER). Al-Hammouri told IPS that at least 25 percent of the 1,000 Palestinian shops in the Old City were closed in recent years as a result of high municipal taxes and a lack of customers. “Taxation is an invisible tool…as dangerous as revoking ID cards and demolishing houses,” he said. “Israel will use this as pressure and as a tool in the future to confiscate these shops and properties.”
By the Same Author
Date: 14/07/2009
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Conflict-Worn Palestinians Carve Out Niches of Joy
Middle-class matrons shop for imported furniture in a marble-and-glass emporium. A new movie house is screening "Transformers." Teens bop to a Danish hip-hop band performing on their high school basketball court. Life in the West Bank — in sharp contrast to beaten down, Hamas-ruled Gaza — has taken on a semblance of normalcy. Exhausted after more than two decades of on-and-off conflict with Israel and deeply skeptical about prospects of statehood, Palestinians here are increasingly trying to carve out their own little niches of happiness. "We need to enjoy our life despite all the difficulties," said housewife Nadia Aweida, in her 50s, after taking in a dance show in the town of Ramallah. It would seem that the West Bank, under U.S.-backed President Mahmoud Abbas, has finally made first steps toward the stability the international community has tried to foster with massive foreign aid and training for Abbas' security forces. But the hopeful signs come with many qualifiers. While Israel has removed several West Bank checkpoints, other obstacles still limit Palestinian mobility to half the territory. The West Bank economy is no longer in free fall, but its growth is "insignificant" and cannot make up for the continued steep decline in Gaza, according to the World Bank. Whatever prosperity there is depends mainly on foreign aid. Meanwhile, Abbas remains locked in a power struggle with the Islamic militant group Hamas in control of the Gaza Strip, under Israeli- and Egyptian-imposed blockade for two years and growing steadily poorer. Israeli settlements in the West Bank keep expanding, and Palestinians fear the idea of "economic peace" espoused by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is a weak substitute for a state of their own. With unemployment widespread, many Palestinians still struggle just to get by. But those with a little cash in their pockets, including those with steady government jobs, say they're tired of waiting for the comforts of a world they can only see on the Internet and TV. Palestinian companies in Ramallah are sponsoring a pickup basketball tournament, first prize $2,500. A festival at Ramallah's Palace of Culture featuring dance and music groups from Turkey, Germany and France is drawing sellout crowds. The Danish hip hop group Outlandish recently performed for 2,000 fans, including teenage girls in jeans and tank tops. With black-clad Palestinian riot police watching from the sidelines, the excited crowd danced, whistled and sang along. The next night, an Iraqi singer had hundreds swaying to his music at an outdoor performance. "This is new in our life and we deserve to live like the others," said audience member Maher Saleh, 29, who works for an advertising agency. An internationally supported law-and-order campaign by Abbas has been critical to the changed atmosphere. Abbas started cracking down two years ago after he lost Gaza, the other territory that is supposed to comprise a Palestinian state, to Hamas. After the second Palestinian uprising against Israeli occupation broke out in 2000, vigilante gunmen ruled and security forces were largely powerless. Even ordinary people took it as license to ignore such basics as paying utility bills. Now they're even being made to wear seat belts while driving. Police are visible in the streets, the vigilantes have handed over their weapons and Hamas militants — the main opponents of the government — have gone underground. The uprising was characterized by suicide bombers striking in Israeli cities and drawing sweeping Israeli reprisals. Israeli raids in search of suspects still go on, but attacks on Israel have all but ended. The West Bank's relative calm could help sway skeptics in Israel who feel Israeli troops cannot leave the territory for fear of ensuing chaos and a takeover by Islamic militants. While Islamists have deepened their hold on Gaza, there are signs that in the West bank, the traditionally secular nature of Palestinian society, which receded during troubled times, is beginning to reassert itself. Mosques still draw bigger crowds for Friday prayers than they did two decades ago, but men and women mingle easily in public and preachers haven't attempted to stop the summer fun. The outside world has come closer in other, unexpected ways: China has led the way in swamping the West Bank with foreign goods, and Persian Gulf firms plan to build large housing complexes. The new feeling of safety has encouraged some Palestinians to invest, particularly in the former militant strongholds of Nablus and Jenin in the northern West Bank, though most business people still hedge their bets. In Nablus, cinemas were shut down by uprising activists in the late 1980s, and when one briefly reopened in 2006, militants shut it at gunpoint, saying it was inappropriate to have fun at a time of national struggle. But now the 175-seat Cinema City, built for $2 million in a new 10-story commercial high-rise, is showing four films a day, mainly Egyptian dramas and comedies but also Hollywood fare like "Transformers" (the 2008 version; the newly released sequel isn't here yet). A former Nablus gunman, Mahdi Abu Ghazaleh, embodies the change. Once a member of the Al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades, a feared militia, he has won amnesty from Israel, like many of his cohorts. He got married this month and now works in the family wholesale business, selling leather goods and plastics. In Jenin, the flagship of change is Herbawi home furnishings, a seven-story tribute to consumerism with gleaming floors and carefully arranged displays. A world away from the West Bank's typical mom-and-pop stores, it carries Krupps espresso machines, along with furniture imported from Malaysia and Turkey. Durgham Zakarneh, 32, makes only makes $600 a month as a civil servant, but he has managed to buy a refrigerator for $400 in 11 monthly payments. "Life is much better now," he said. "People can do business without worrying." Other Herbawi stores will open soon in other West Bank cities, said Ziad Turabi, manager of the fledgling chain. Like the Nablus cinema manager, Turabi said he wouldn't have made the $4 million investment in Jenin without the new sense of security, provided in part by disciplined police freshly trained in neighboring Jordan in a U.S.-sponsored program. However, Israeli checkpoints still put a damper on the business — though Israel would argue the presence of its troops also helps keep a lid on militants. The Israeli separation barrier, built to keep out suicide attackers, cuts off the Herbawi store in Jenin from a valued clientele — Israeli Arabs. Israel doesn't allow its citizens to drive through the barrier crossing closest to Jenin, so they have to detour for miles to get to Herbawi's. Even so, there's more freedom of movement. The Hawara roadblock outside Nablus used to be the West Bank's worst bottleneck, allowing Palestinians to cross only on foot after long waits. Now, for the first time since 2000, they can drive through. The Israeli army has loosened the other checkpoints in its noose around the city, and large crowds are expected at the city's monthlong shopping festival, which will feature an attempt to get into the Guinness Book of World Records with a city-block-length tray of kanafe, a sweet-and-sour pastry Saleh, the ad agency employee, said he's ready to have a good time after years of gloom. "We had an uprising, we had hardship under occupation," he said. "We need singing and joy. We need to live a human life."
Date: 04/07/2009
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The Palestinian Obama
Over the last few weeks, we witnessed three speeches by three leaders at three universities: United States President Barack Obama and his speech at Cairo University, Israeli Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu and his speech at Bar Ilan University, and Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad and his speech at al-Quds University. In their three speeches, the three leaders had three elements in common. All three are highly educated leaders who follow modern trends in fields of knowledge. They are aware that modern achievements are built on science, knowledge and technology, and have therefore chosen to deliver their speeches at institutions of knowledge. All three leaders presented new and revolutionary approaches to ancient and intractable problems: President Obama presented the idea of changing the relation based on a legacy of conflict between Islam and the West. Netanyahu presented the idea of a demilitarized Palestinian state to resolve the historic conflict between the two peoples. Fayyad presented the idea of building the institutions of the state before the state itself. The three leaders are skilled in public relations and influencing the public through launching creative, visionary ideas and projects. They know how to engage and ignite political debate and how to channel public opinion in the direction they desire. After all, the ability to engage and define the debate in the media, and among the political elite and public opinion at large is one of the challenges that determine the success of the any leader or institution. Realizing such ideas – many of which are meta-projects – requires an abundance of power, resources, supporting factors and mechanisms. President Obama's idea needs a new environment that can only come through a fundamental change in US policy and diplomacy – a change that goes to some of its historic pillars. At the forefront of such changes would be to indicate the willingness to actually pressure Israel to end its occupation of Arab lands, or at least those lands considered by US diplomacy as occupied. Netanyahu's ideas require a change in ideology not only on the part of the Prime Minister himself and the right wing, but also the Israeli political community at large, which is yet to reach consensus around the fundamentals of the political solution with the Palestinians. Much could be said about the hidden objectives behind Netanyahu's ideas, not the least of which is the desire to abort US pressure, and to render a state meaningless through excluding Jerusalem and refugees from negotiations. Many of these analyses are correct, yet much can be built on the mere fact that he recognized the right of Palestinians to a state. This requires other elements to change, whether domestically in the area of Jewish national consensus or externally in the field of US diplomacy. Salam Fayyad's idea needs new Palestinian political thinking – one that can rise from the debris of the old experience that led the Palestinians to a division that has made them – even in their own eyes – unworthy of an independent state. A division that, as the saying goes, has made "wolves show more mercy than brothers", and which has created two authorities whose daily human rights violations pose a substantial new challenge to all who seek a healthy civil and political life in our country. Fayyad's idea lifts the institutions of the Palestinian Authority (PA), and subsequently the state, into the superstructure of society, above the factional fights over power. It shifts the PA from an authority that is defined by factions into one that revolves around institutions, service provision and accessibility to all. It transforms the institutions of the PA into modern state institutions that render the Palestinian in the eyes of the world, and indeed in their own eyes, worthy of an independent state. The international dimension is important in the creation of modern political entities. It was important in the creation of Israel, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Kosovo and elsewhere. It will be crucial in Palestine. No-one, not even the factions competing for power, imagines that a Palestinian state can be created absent international will. The international factor is important in the Palestinian case, first in order to create pressure on Israel, and second to provide financial support for the creation of the institutions and infrastructure of a state. Some might look at international financial support as a sedative. A quick glance at the current financial crisis facing the PA as a result of many donors, particularly in Arab countries, stopping their contributions shows the extent to which such aid is needed. Let us imagine for a moment what would happen if the government stops paying 240 million dollars worth of monthly salaries, not to mention other current and development expenditures. In order for it to succeed, Fayyad's idea about the state needs mechanisms capable of mobilizing the street in its direction, away from many factions that only see our country in terms of the interests and privileges they can gain from the PA. Fayyad's idea is a challenge to the awareness and sensibility of Palestinians to the higher national interest, above factional interests and visions. No-one can forget the Israeli obstacle – the obstacle of occupation and settlements. But the Palestinians' worthiness of ending the occupation and mobilizing international support for the realization of this goal will be subject to their ability to unite themselves around the idea of a state. Such a state must encompass everyone from Rafah to Jenin, and should accommodate the whole political spectrum from al-Tahrir party that seeks to re-establish the Caliphate to the leftist factions that are seeking a new, viable left along the Latin American model. In the world of business, it is said that an idea is worth a million dollars. In the world of politics, ideas such as Obama's vision of a new world, or Salam Fayyad's idea of establishing the institutions of a state that transcends all other considerations, are worth much more than money. Salam Fayyad did not come from within the factional elite. The Palestinian streets acceptance of his ideas will be analogous to the American street's endorsement of Barack Obama, who himself did not emerge from the white elite. ATFP Translation
Date: 23/07/2008
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British Leader Presses Israel to Halt Settlements
BETHLEHEM, West Bank - British Prime Minister Gordon Brown demanded yesterday that Israel cease settlement construction and promised more money to jump-start the battered Palestinian economy. In his first trip to Israel and the Palestinian territories as Britain's leader, Brown repeatedly stressed that economics are key to Mideast peace, and said Israel should ease travel restrictions in the West Bank that have hindered commerce. But his strongest comments were reserved for the settlements: "I think the whole European Union is very clear on this matter: We want to see a freeze on settlements." "Settlement expansion has made peace harder to achieve. It erodes trust, it heightens Palestinian suffering, it makes the compromises Israel needs to make for peace more difficult," Brown said at a news conference with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas in the West Bank town of Bethlehem. Abbas went further in his criticism of Israel's construction in disputed East Jerusalem and the adjacent West Bank, telling Brown that Israel lacks commitment to the "principles and spirit" of Mideast peace efforts. He singled out stepped-up construction of homes for Jews in areas of Jerusalem that the Palestinians claim for their capital. At a joint appearance after meeting Brown later in Jerusalem, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert acknowledged that Israel disagreed with the Palestinians and Britain on the settlements, but added: "I am absolutely convinced, Mr. Prime Minister, that this should not stand in the way of an agreement between us and the Palestinians." Olmert repeated his contention that agreement is "closer than ever" and said he hoped for an accord by year's end. Israel and the Palestinians resumed peace talks late last year at a U.S.-backed conference in Annapolis, Md. Both sides had originally aspired to reach a final peace deal by the end of the year, but have backed away from that goal somewhat because of arguments over settlements and whether the Palestinians are capable of enforcing security in areas they control. Under the first phase of the internationally backed peace plan known as the road map, which is the basis of the negotiations, Israel was to freeze all settlement construction and Palestinians were to crack down on extremist groups. Brown's two-day visit to the region has been overshadowed by a claim from a Shiite militia holding five British hostages in Iraq that one of the captives killed himself. Brown arrived in the region after visiting Iraq, where he met with Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and discussed the plight of British hostages kidnapped by a Shiite group a year ago. Shortly after his departure, he called the suicide report "a very distressing development" and demanded that the Shiite militia "immediately and unconditionally" release the Britons.
Date: 27/11/2007
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Bush, Olmert Said Hopeful on Mideast
Hours before the opening of a high-stakes international conference on the Middle East, President Bush and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert expressed hope Monday that peace finally could be achieved. A senior member of the Palestinian delegation said an elusive joint statement on the contours for future talks was within reach. "I'm looking forward to continuing our serious dialogue with you and the president of the Palestinian Authority to see whether or not peace is possible," Bush said after meeting with Olmert in the Oval Office ahead of the conference. Bush had a similar meeting scheduled with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas later in the day. "I'm optimistic," Bush said. Olmert said that international support _ from Bush and also, presumably, from the Arab nations that will attend the conference in Annapolis, Md. _ "is very important to us" and could make all the difference. "This time, it's different because we are going to have a lot of participation in what I hope will launch a serious process negotiation between us and the Palestinians," Olmert said, referring to the talks expected to begin in earnest after this week's U.S.-hosted meetings. "We and the Palestinians will sit together in Jerusalem and work out something that will be very good." After months of trying to forge a joint outline, Israel and the Palestinians have made an 11th-hour push in recent days to come up with a statement for presentation at Tuesday's gathering in Annapolis, Md. It is to be the first time that Israel, a large group of Arab states and international envoys from around the world will sit down together to try to relaunch a peace process. Later Monday, the conference gets under way with a dinner at the State Department. "We will reach a joint paper today or tomorrow," Yasser Abed Rabbo, a senior aide to Abbas, told The Associated Press. "There is a persistent American effort to have this statement." Talks on the joint statement had faltered over a Palestinian desire that it address, at least in general terms, key issues of Palestinian statehood _ final borders, sovereignty over disputed Jerusalem and the fate of Palestinian refugees who lost homes in Israel following its 1948 creation. Israel has pressed for a broader, vaguer statement of commitment to two states living side-by-side in peace. It has promised to negotiate the contentious issues, however, in the formal negotiations that are to follow the conference. Bush will open the Annapolis conference with a speech. He'll make clear that Mideast peace is a top priority for the rest of his time in office through January 2009, but he is expected to conclude that the time is not right for him to advance his own ideas on how to achieve that, Bush national security adviser Stephen Hadley said Sunday. "The Israelis and Palestinians have waited a long time for this vision to be realized, and I call upon all those gathering in Annapolis this week to redouble their efforts to turn dreams of peace into reality," Bush said Sunday night in a statement. Hadley said the Annapolis sessions are designed not to be negotiations, but to launch them. And because the two sides already have taken the unexpected step of agreeing to negotiations, the joint document became less necessary as a vehicle to bring them to that point, he said. The run-up to the meeting has been fraught with disputes, skepticism and suspicion about the opposing parties' good faith. And expectations remain low. But Bush has been buoyed by Arab endorsement of the meeting and the possibilities for broader peacemaking. Clinching a joint statement of objectives from Abbas and Olmert might was seen as a tall order because of the charged issues that divide the two sides. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice wasn't able to bridge the gaps, even after eight missions to the region this year. Israeli and Palestinian negotiators met late Sunday with Rice in a last-ditch effort to wrap up the task. "We're confident there will be a document and we'll get to Annapolis in good shape on that," but bargaining may continue behind the scenes on Tuesday, State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said.
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