Rice Announces Resumption of Mideast Peace Talks Despite Lack of Cease-Fire
JERUSALEM _ Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice announced a resumption of Israeli-Palestinian peace talks Wednesday, but without pressing for a cease-fire that Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas urged to halt the violence that derailed negotiations earlier this week.
The potential for another flare-up in the Gaza Strip, where the militant Hamas movement is in control, continues to threaten peace efforts, which are being pursued only with Abbas, whose Fatah faction is dominant in the West Bank.
Abbas had publicly pushed for a cease-fire as a condition for a resumption of talks with Israel. But he relented after Rice telephoned him just before an afternoon news conference in which she planned to announce the resumed talks, to which U.S. officials believed he had agreed earlier in the day.
The announcement came after two days of meetings with Israeli and Palestinian leaders, but Rice did not specify a date for the resumed talks.
“I have been informed by the parties that they intend to resume the negotiations and that they are in contact with one another as to how to bring this about,” Rice said in a joint appearance with Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni.
Abbas, under strong domestic pressure, had suspended the negotiations Sunday after Israeli air and ground assaults over the past week killed more than 120 Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, both militants and civilians.
The Israelis stepped up their attacks after a man was killed by rocket fire in the border town of Sderot and militants fired Katyusha-type rockets at the coastal city of Ashkelon, some 10 miles from Gaza, extending the range of their strikes.
Earlier Wednesday, Abbas had said that he would not go back to negotiations without a cease-fire in Gaza, but after he talked to Rice, his office put out a statement saying he had agreed. “We have the intention of resuming the peace process and the negotiations,” he was quoted as saying.
Rice said that Abbas “has spoken publicly about his desire for a cease-fire, but this is not a condition for resumption of the talks.”
Rice reportedly called to reconfirm Abbas’ commitment to the renewed talks after he was quoted in the news media saying he would not agree until a truce was declared between Israel and Hamas, The Washington Post reported.
In a nod to Palestinian demands, Rice said that Lt. Gen. William Fraser III, appointed by President Bush to monitor compliance with the “road map” peace plan, would come to the region to be chairman of the first meeting of a trilateral committee to examine whether the parties were meeting their obligations.
The first phase of the American-backed plan requires the Palestinians to crack down on violent militants and obliges Israel to freeze settlement activity in the West Bank. The plan is a basis for the revived peace talks, launched at an international conference held by Bush in November in Annapolis, Md., with the declared aim of reaching a peace agreement by the end of the year.
“We do need to have improvements on the ground, we do need to have the parties meeting their road map obligations,” Rice said, adding that such changes would make negotiations “more robust.”
But on the crucial issue of a cease-fire in Gaza, Rice did not suggest that any progress was made, nor did she call for a truce.
“I have made clear our view … the rockets against Israel have to stop, and … as Israel defends itself, Israel also needs to be very careful about innocent people who get caught in the crossfire, about humanitarian conditions in Gaza,” Rice said.
The Israeli security Cabinet met Wednesday and authorized more attacks on militant targets and “Hamas institutions” in the Gaza Strip, an official statement said, but Prime Minister Ehud Olmert appeared to leave the door open to an undeclared truce on the ground.
“If there is no rocket fire at Israel, there will be no Israeli attack on Gaza,” he told reporters.
Militants in Gaza fired 10 rockets, 7 of which landed in Israel on Wednesday, but there were no casualties, the army said.
Abbas has suggested that Egypt help mediate a cease-fire, and Rice said she would send David Welch, an assistant secretary of state, to Cairo to discuss security and humanitarian issues in Gaza. But she did not mention a truce. “We’re not trying to broker something here,” she said.
With the U.S. and Israel boycotting Hamas, it is difficult for either to openly sanction truce talks with what they consider a terrorist group. But some Israeli commentators have argued that a cease-fire, negotiated through a third party, is the best way forward.
“There’s a perception in Israel that reaching an understanding with Hamas means that you recognize it, which is baseless,” said Shlomo Brom of the Institute for National Security Studies at Tel Aviv University. “This is not diplomatic negotiation with Hamas but indirect talks through mediators. It has been done in the past, and it would not represent a significant departure in Israeli policy.”
___
(c) 2008, Chicago Tribune.
Visit the Chicago Tribune on the Internet at http://www.chicagotribune.com/
Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.
For reprints, email tmsreprints@permissionsgroup.com, call 800-374-7985 or 847-635-6550, send a fax to 847-635-6968, or write to The Permissions Group Inc., 1247 Milwaukee Ave., Suite 303, Glenview, IL 60025, USA.