Rice Tries to Hold Together Plan for Mideast Talks
RAMALLAH, Feb. 18 — Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice struggled Sunday to hold together her ambitious plan to restart Middle East peace talks, even as arguments continued over a new Palestinian unity government in a signal that the Bush administration’s renewed peace push might have arrived at a bad time.
Ms. Rice, shuttling between Jerusalem and the occupied West Bank, said she planned to continue to push a peace initiative between Israel and the Palestinian Authority president, Mahmoud Abbas, despite his recent agreement in principle to form a unity government between his Fatah faction and Hamas, which the United States and Israel view as a terrorist organization.
“I’m committed to this,” Ms. Rice told reporters at the end of a day of preparatory meetings with Palestinian and Israeli officials. “As long as I’m secretary of state, that’s what I’m going to do.”
The new talks — the first such negotiations in six years — are set for Monday. Ms. Rice will act as host for the meeting with Mr. Abbas and Prime Minister Ehud Olmert of Israel at her hotel in Jerusalem.
During a meeting with Mr. Abbas at his heavily fortified compound in Ramallah, Ms. Rice made clear that she was willing to begin work on a peace deal with him even if the United States boycotted a unity government. That might allow Mr. Abbas, as the leader of the Palestine Liberation Organization, to hold talks with Israel even if a new Palestinian unity government did not recognize Israel or renounce violence, two conditions that Israel and the United States have both demanded.
Mr. Abbas’s aides were buoyant after the meeting. “We’re encouraged,” one Palestinian official said.
But the big question now is whether Israel will agree to restart peace talks with Mr. Abbas while it is boycotting the government he helped negotiate. For Ms. Rice, that may be a tough sell.
The Israelis committed to attend the Monday meeting, which was supposed to be the first step in rejuvenating the peace process. But for the past three days, Israeli officials have been dumping cold water on any talk of further cooperation with the Palestinians unless a new government recognizes Israel.
“The path to a Palestinian state goes through renunciation of terrorism and violence,” Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni said Saturday night. Mr. Olmert added Sunday, in broadcast comments, that a Palestinian government that does not recognize Israel and renounce violence “cannot receive recognition, and there will not be cooperation with it.”
Mr. Olmert reiterated that point when Ms. Rice returned to Jerusalem from her meeting in Ramallah, Israeli officials said.
Ms. Rice said she expected the effort on peace negotiations to be slow. “If we ask people to run at this point, I think somebody will fall down,” she said.
And even if talks do begin, they are likely to be hampered by the reality that both Mr. Abbas, who has to share power with Hamas, and Mr. Olmert, whose approval ratings are low, may not have the political capital to make compromises.
The prospects for energized peace talks got even worse two weeks ago when Mr. Abbas and Hamas reached the power-sharing agreement, brokered by the Saudi government, in Mecca.
The Mecca agreement includes a vague promise to “respect” previous peace deals, which some Palestinian officials have said they hope can persuade Western donors to restore direct aid that was cut off after Hamas won legislative elections in 2006. But the Mecca pact makes no mention of recognizing Israel, nor any mention of renouncing violence toward it, which Western donors have said are conditions for restoring aid.
Both Israeli and Bush administration officials were angry about the agreement, arguing that Hamas got a deal without being forced to bring its views closer to those of Mr. Abbas, who is viewed by the United States, the European Union and Israel as more moderate.
During Sunday’s session, Ms. Rice and Mr. Abbas discussed the proposed composition of the new Palestinian cabinet, American and Palestinian officials said. Hamas and Mr. Abbas’s Fatah Party have yet to resolve some key government posts, including who will be interior minister, a post that controls the Hamas-dominated parallel police force.
Mr. Abbas defended his unity deal with Hamas, saying it ended weeks of fighting between Hamas and his Fatah faction that killed almost 100 Palestinians.
“Let me just say, I understand fully the desire to end the violence among the Palestinians,” Ms. Rice said. “That period of time was terrible.”
Diplomats and Middle East analysts said that while Mr. Abbas could represent the Palestinians and initiate peace talks with Israel, he probably could not conclude those talks unless the entire Palestinian government recognized Israel.
Rice Tries to Hold Together Plan for Mideast Talks - New York Times: "2007"
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