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Many more Americans continue to side with Israel rather than the Palestinian Authority, but - with President Obama's first visit there days away - most also prefer to leave peace negotiations to the two protagonists, rather than having the United States take the lead. Fifty-five percent in this ABC News/Washington Post poll sympathize more with Israel, vs. 9 percent who side more with the Palestinian Authority, with the rest favoring neither, or undecided. It's been a similar gap for many years, including polling back to the 1980s testing Israel vs. the Arab nations of the Middle East. See PDF with...

When President Obama and Afghan President Hamid Karzai announced Jan. 11 that a negotiating office for the Taliban was about to open in the Persian Gulf emirate of Qatar, optimism soared within the administration that peace talks would soon be back on track. But January’s optimism has become February’s reality check: There is still no agreement to open the office, and Karzai, back in Kabul after his Washington visit, says there will be no deal until Qatar meets his conditions in writing. As the Obama administration nears a decision on the pace of U.S. combat troop withdrawals from Afghanistan between...

This column was co-authored by Bob MorrisonSen. John Kerry has a long and dubious record in foreign policy. In the 1970's, he testified against his fellow Vietnam War veterans before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. He charged that they were violating the Geneva Conventions every day in Vietnam. Some POWs were outraged at Kerry's disloyal statements. They said they had been tortured by their Communist captors trying to force them to make such untrue statements. Worse, Kerry went to Paris in 1971. There, he met with North Vietnamese Communists. We need to see all his notes from those meetings....

Gaza truce agreed, Hamas says, to take effect in hours By Nidal al-Mughrabi and Jeffrey Heller | Reuters – 30 mins ago GAZA/JERUSALEM (Reuters) - An Egyptian-brokered ceasefire in the Gaza conflict will go into effect later on Tuesday, a Hamas official said. There was no immediate Israeli comment. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said earlier he was open to a long-term deal to halt Palestinian rocket attacks on his country. "An agreement for calm has been reached. It will be declared at 9 o'clock (1900 GMT) and go into effect at midnight (2200 GMT)," Hamas official Ayman Taha told Reuters...

U.S. intelligence officials acknowledged Tuesday that the United States may release several Afghan Taliban prisoners from the military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, as an incentive to bring the Taliban to peace talks. Meanwhile, Afghan officials told The Associated Press that a plan to give Afghanistan a form of legal custody over the men if they are released satisfied their earlier objection to sending the prisoners to a third country. Director of National Intelligence Jim Clapper told Congress Tuesday that no decision had been made on whether to trade the five Taliban prisoners, now held at Guantanamo Bay as part...

*snip* As part of the accelerating, high-stakes diplomacy, Reuters has learned, the United States is considering the transfer of an unspecified number of Taliban prisoners from the Guantanamo Bay military prison into Afghan government custody. It has asked representatives of the Taliban to match that confidence-building measure with some of their own. Those could include a denunciation of international terrorism and a public willingness to enter formal political talks with the government headed by Afghan President Hamid Karzai. The officials acknowledged that the Afghanistan diplomacy, which has reached a delicate stage in recent weeks, remains a long shot. Among the...

The Middle East is usually full of deception, duplicity, and backstabbing in its political both intra-country and inter-country. There is often a huge gap between actions and words. At times, it appears that nobody says what they mean and nobody means what they say. So, it comes as little surprise that the Israeli-Palestinian negotiations should go through an intermediary, the United States, and that there is deceit galore, at levels beyond anything I can remember. The Palestinian Authority in their dealings with the United States perpetrates the first deceit, and then there is the deceit in the approach and manipulation...

Between President Mahmoud Abbas, Prime Minister Salam Fayyad, and Head Negotiators Yasser Abed Rabbo and Saeb Erekat, the Palestinian spokespeople have threatened every conceivable position regarding the moribund talks with Israel over the past couple of weeks. These threats include but are not limited to, unilaterally declaring an independent Palestinian State along the border of the Green Line, taking the entire negotiations to the United Nations for a final dispensation, dissolving the Palestinian Authority and throwing the whole of the West Bank back on Israel to maintain, and cutting all relations and cooperation with Israel declaring the Roadmap and Oslo...

The package Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu has accepted for US-sponsored talks with the Palestinians contains more substantial concessions than merely a freeze on settlement construction and goes far beyond the one-year deal put before the security cabinet Saturday night, Nov. 13, debkafile reports from Jerusalem and Washington. The deal unveiled in Jerusalem early Sunday is only stage one of a larger secret package to which only Netanyahu and his close adviser Yithzak Molho are privy - not even Defense Minister Ehud Barak or the Chief of Staff, Lt. Gen. Gaby Ashkenazi.

Over the past year and a half, Hezballah has been restocking their inventory of rockets storing many in the Bekaa Valley. Hezballah has also been in violation of the United Nations resolution that ended the conflict between them and Israel back in 2006 by rebuilding military positions and bunkers and storing rockets and other war supplies south of the Litany River. Further acts in violation of the so-called rules of law have been manifest by Hezballah having placed their weapon caches within hospitals, schools, mosques, and residential homes. Through all of this, Europe, the United States, the United Nations, Russia,...

Prime Minister Netanyahu of Israel has offered to renew the moratorium on building settlements in the West Bank in order for peace talks with the Palestinians to continue. Palestinians have said that that they will not continue with the talks if the moratorium was lifted. Netanyahu has acceded to their wishes, asking in return that the Palestinians recognize Israel as a Jewish state. The Palestinians have categorically replied that they are unwilling to do so, which means that the peace talks are dead and that they have killed them. Anyone who doesn't recognize that Israel is a Jewish state and...

Ever since Israel’s miraculous victories in the Six Day War (1967) and the Yom Kippur War (1973), the world has pressured Israel to return the land gained in defense against her neighbors’ belligerence. Egypt was the first country to break with the “Three No’s” (no peace with Israel, no recognition of Israel, no negotiations with Israel) position defined by the Muslim world during the Khartoum Conference. This led to the return of the entire Sinai Peninsula, an area of land significantly larger than all of Israel, to Egypt in exchange for what has become a chilly peace. A member of...

KABUL, Afghanistan – Taliban officials have engaged in periodic, discreet contacts with Afghan and U.S. officials for months but are unwilling to move to formal peace negotiations until the U.S. agrees to a timetable for the withdrawal of all foreign troops, according to a Pakistani intelligence official and members of a newly formed Afghan peace council. The White House said Wednesday that President Barack Obama supports attempts by the Afghan government to open peace talks with Taliban leaders, but still wants the insurgents to renounce violence and their support of al-Qaida. However, press secretary Robert Gibbs said the United States...

In Israel, politics is the national pastime. Israelis follow politics the same way certain New Yorkers absorb every statistic, past and present, about the Yankees. Last week, which was sandwiched between the Jewish new year and the holiest day of the year, Yom Kippur, Israelis were still following the news - just not the latest round of Middle East peace talks. News outlets gave what felt like obligatory coverage, but the talks typically ranked as the second or third item. This is a pronounced shift from past go-rounds, in which the primarily left-of-center news industry breathlessly provided wall-to-wall coverage. This...

Mr. Prime Minister; Many Jews both from Israel and in the Diaspora have reacted with horror and revulsion to the latest Time Magazine Cover Story, “Why Jews Don’t Care About Peace.” Time’s base use of the Shylock blood libel is beyond false, it is disgusting. But perhaps there is a lesson beyond the obvious hatred against Jews in general, Israel specially, and you, Mr. Prime Minister, can take from this journalistic episode. Time has unwittingly pulled back the veil and shown exactly how the world media will, for the most part, depict the breakup of the current peace talks should...

I would like to say I’m shocked but the only surprise is it took this long for President Obama to call for the continuation of the building freeze on Jewish areas in Judea and Samaria while making no comment on Arab and Muslim building of illegal structures throughout the same area and especially in and around Jerusalem. President Obama has still not made mention of the illegal buildings erected by Arabs, Muslims, and Druze illegal building within the Green Line in uncontested Israel, especially in the Negev where the problem has become endemic lately. The one positive consequence of this...

First, we need to identify what the Palestinian demands will consist. The extension of the building freeze is probably the most obvious. Many of the other demands are a rehash of long standing demands including Right of Return, total control of Jerusalem’s Old City, return to the Green Line (pre 1967 borders), release of all Palestinian prisoners held by Israel, free passage between the West Bank and Gaza, end of the blockade of Gaza, removal of all IDF troops, checkpoints, travel restrictions, and other prohibitions imposed to prevent terror attacks. The truth is that even should Israel concede and meet...

Yitzchak and Talia Emes, 47 and 45 years old, along with 24-year-old Avishai Shindler, married just a year, and 37-year-old Kochava Even Haim were recently murdered while returning to their homes after a day in Jerusalem by Hamas terrorists in a drive by shooting. Over three-dozen bullets had been fired at their vehicle, including a number from point blank range to assure that the attack had killed and not merely wounded its targets. The response in Israel was one of shock and abhorrence while in the Palestinian areas of the West Bank and Gaza there was much celebratory dancing and...

Rumors in the news speak of Prime Minister Netanyahu trying to find an unhappy medium whereby we have a freeze on building but do not really have a freeze in building beyond the Green Line. The claim is his government is looking for a magic combination that will allow enough building to keep the coalition together while restricting the building sufficiently to keep Mahmoud Abbas happy and sitting at the negotiating table. Despite the obvious problem that any building will cause Abbas to throw a fit which will require some unwise concession to placate him free of any return of...

JERUSALEM - While Benjamin Netanyahu has publicly blessed the Palestinian Authority's return to direct negotiations, a combination of deadlines, timetables and financial factors could turn the renewed peace process into a political curse for the Israeli prime minister. Netanyahu spent this past weekend with members of his inner cabinet crunching the political and financial numbers associated with what the Israeli leader has himself termed "making the painful choices for peace." Both Yediot Aharonot and Yisrael Hayom reported that Deputy Prime Minister Dan Meridor, the most dovish member of the inner cabinet, suggested that Netanyahu announce Israel will continue to build...

In 1994, Israel asserted, and the PLO accepted, that construction would continue on existing Jewish settlements. For the next 15 years, negotiations were never stopped by that building. In January 2009, the Palestinian Authority (PA) stopped negotiations because Hamas attacked Israel from the Gaza Strip and Israel defended itself. Of course, Hamas is also the PA's enemy and the PA would be delighted if Israel destroyed that group. But for public relations' purposes, the PA had to pretend inter-Palestinian solidarity. Then came President Barack Obama who demanded a stop to all construction on settlements in 2009. Israel finally complied but...

Speaking at Herzliya Conference, Netanyahu praises Palestinian efforts to improve economy and build institutions, appeals to them to accept resumption of efforts toward peace accord. Photo by: GPO Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said Wednesday he had reason to believe that long-stalled peace talks with the Palestinians could resume in a matter of weeks. Netanyahu did not give details, but an Israeli official indicated Israel would take a step to make it possible for the Palestinians to agree to talks. He did not give details and spoke on condition of anonymity because no offer has been made. Palestinians have been insisting...

The Middle East peace talks are at a deadlock. Negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians to move ahead with the plan established by the so-called Quartet – the US., U.N., EU and Russia -- have faltered and come to a complete standstill. Continuing with this inertia will have a long-term negative effect on the future of the region both from a political point of view as well as from a business perspective. With the exception of a few risk-takers, what company or business executive would be willing to invest in the Middle East once the region plunges onto the abyss...

Truthfully, the real reason there is no peace between Israel and the Palestinians is the Palestinians don't want peace. No other country in the world has made concessions the way Israel has. Since 1977, they given up areas of land three times the size of the State of Israel. The Oslo process began in 1993. Sixteen years have passed since then, and they are no closer to a permanent settlement. The Palestinians don't want peace, after all its bad for buisness. It is the hatred of Israel that allows the PA to keep power. It deflects public anger from their...

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu declared that he wanted to immediately resume negotiations with the Palestinians Monday and rejected the charge that he wasn't interested in reaching an agreement. "We need to move toward peace with a sense of urgency and a sense of purpose," Netanyahu told the Jewish Federations of North America's General Assembly during a trip to Washington. "My goal is not negotiations for the sake of negotiations; My goal is to achieve a permanent peace treaty between Israel and the Palestinians, and soon. I cannot be more emphatic on this point." Critics of Netanyahu, particularly in the Arab...

Palestinians on Sunday accused US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton of undermining progress toward Mideast peace talks after she praised Israel for offering to curb some Jewish settlement construction

TEL AVIV, Israel — Israeli and Palestinian activists on Tuesday presented the most detailed vision yet of what a peace deal could look like — more than 400 pages crammed with maps, timetables for troop withdrawals and even a list of weapons a non-militarized Palestine would be barred from having. The manual has no official standing, but has generated interest among Israeli and Palestinian leaders and is meant to show it's still possible to establish a Palestinian state alongside Israel, despite many setbacks, said those involved in the drafting. The plan's details illustrated the many obstacles that have to be...

President Obama's Middle East policy is in ruins. While the US continues to press Israel for a settlement freeze (and now a freeze on Jerusalem) his strategy is falling apart piece by piece. He has turned the Israeli populace against him and strengthened the hand of Prime Minister Netanyahu. At the same time he has eroded his own support among American Jews and other US friends of Israel. The Arab League nations answered no to the Presidents request for a peace gesture and the President of the Palestinian Authority uses Obama's settlement pressure as his "out" from re-entering negotiations. What...

Defense minister briefs senior cabinet members on London meeting with Obama's Mideast envoy; one of them quoted as saying Barak 'offered dismantling of illegal West Bank outposts in exchange for nothing' Roni Sofer "(Defense Minister Ehud) Barak returned with nothing from his talks with (special US Mideast envoy) George Mitchell; it appears that he offered the dismantling of illegal West Bank outposts in exchange for nothing," a senior minister said Tuesday. The minister, who asked to remain nameless, was also quoted by his associates as saying, "The inclusion of Syria and Lebanon in the statement on a comprehensive peace agreement...

For the past month or so, President Obama has been putting most of the blame for the lack of Middle East peace on Israel and the settlements. His demand of a settlement building freeze requires a prohibition on construction inside the footprint of communities that today are de facto Israeli territory. These are the city-settlements that have long been slated for inclusion into Israel in any final-status agreement, with equivalent Israeli territory awarded to the future Palestinian state through land swaps. But the presidential myopia goes beyond that, Obama has chosen to ignore the one single fact that has stalled...

Since we are about to embark on another fruitless peace effort in the Middle East, it probably makes sense to take another look a the UN Resolution we will be hearing a lot about over the next few months, resolution 242. You will hear politicians and diplomats say that Israel must withdraw to the pre-1967 borders per UN Resolution 242. These people have no Idea what the resolution calls for: Withdrawal of Israel armed forces from territories occupied in the recent conflict; It all surrounds the use (or non-use) of one simple article "The." The Arab side and their supporters...

Most people do not understand the real problem with securing a "two-state solution" between the Palestinians and Israel, only one side, Israel is interested in achieving peace. The Palestinians have NEVER made the commitment to live aside a Jewish State of Israel, in fact the new PA government is not even willing to commit to new negotiations. As reported by my friend Barry Rubin: The Palestinian Authority (PA) has announced its thirteenth government in fourteen years. Its prime minister is Salam Fayad, a Westernized professional economist who has no political base whatsoever. Why is he prime minister? The only reason...

Well this should make negotiations go much quicker. Palestinian President and "Moderate Terrorist, Mahmoud Abbas said yesterday that there will be no negotiations until Israel agrees to return to the pre-Six-Day-War Borders. Previously he has said that he will not recognize a Israel as a Jewish State, Israel must agree to give the Temple Mount to the Palestinians, and that Israel must agree to a Palestinian right of return. In other words, give us everything we want, then we can talk. Folks, this kind of talk proves that there will peace will not happen in the near future, because the...

ANKARA (Reuters) - U.S. President Barack Obama said on Monday the United States strongly supported the aim of setting up a Palestinian state living "side by side" and at peace with Israel.

In the Israeli political game, there are some things too important to play with. Has new Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu safeguarded Israel’s security and foreign relations while meeting party and coalition needs, and what is the likely result of this new government’s policies internationally? Netanyahu had to put together a complex web of parties and personalities to get a Knesset majority. The result is a cabinet with more ministers than Jerusalem has rabbis. Yet equally impressive is that of the 30 ministers, almost half of them will deal with some element of national security or foreign policy. Is this a...

The Pro Arab Lobby always needs a boogie man. For years it was former Prime Minister Ariel Sharon. You remember him, he was the guy who unilaterally pulled out of Gaza. In fact even when he did that, he was roundly criticized. After the stroke that keeps Sharon in a coma to this day, Ehud Olmert took the stance to aggressively pursue peace at all costs,possibly to hide the corruption that surrounded his administration. What Olmert found is that even the supposedly moderate Abu Mazen was not a willing peace partner. Within two days Bibi Netanyahu will take the premiership...

The expected appointment of a special envoy to breathe new life into Israeli-Palestinian negotiations could split the pro-Israel center while pleasing the Jewish left and outraging the right. The schism could be particularly deep if, as widely reported this week, President Barack Obama appoints former Sen. George Mitchell to do the job. Some Jewish leaders say the very qualities that may appeal to the Obama administration - Mitchell's reputation as an honest broker - could spark some unhappiness, if not outright opposition, from some pro-Israel groups. "Sen. Mitchell is fair. He's been meticulously even handed," said Abraham Foxman, national director...

Israel Cabinet: Israel, Syria In Serious, Responsible Peace Negotiations By Israel News Agency Staff Jerusalem ----- May 25, 2008 ....... The following was communicated by the Israel Cabinet Secretariat and the Israel Government Press Office to the Israel News Agency. At the weekly Cabinet meeting held today in Jerusalem, Israel Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Israel Security Agency Director Yuval Diskin briefed ministers on diplomatic and security matters. The former discussed the resumption of contacts between Israel and Syria on the basis of the 1991 Madrid Conference. The latter reviewed the situation in Gaza, including the sides' positions on the...

Published: 04.09.08, 23:20 / Israel News US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice plans to travel to the Middle East this month to build support among Arab countries for Israeli-Palestinian peace talks and to lobby Iraq's neighbors for help in stabilizing Iraq. State Department spokesman Sean McCormack says Rice will meet April 22 with foreign ministers from the Gulf Cooperation Council, Egypt and Jordan in Bahrain. He says she plans to discuss Middle East peace talks as well as Iraq. (AP)

Syria is softening its refusal to attend the Annapolis peace conference and already has won dividends, including a visit from Jordan's king that marked an end to regional isolation. But as it bends, it risks alienating Palestinian militants and its ally Iran. Syria was unlikely to announce a final decision on whether it will go to the conference until after a meeting of Arab foreign ministers to be held in Cairo on Friday to map out a joint strategy. Publicly, Syrian officials have said Syria would not go unless its demands for the return of the Golan Heights, seized by...

From the (Vermont) Burlington Free Press: Peace activist Cindy Sheehan cancels Vermont visitJuly 28, 20Peace activist Cindy Sheehan has canceled her visit to Vermont because she plans a trip to Jordan for peace talks there, organizers announced today.Sheehan was to have attended a rally Sunday at Montpelier's Unitarian Church.The rally will still be held, with Vermont organizers planning to address renewed efforts to end the war in Iraq and pursue impeachment of the Bush administration.The event is scheduled to begin at 7 p.m. and is free and public. It’s sort of like Ike saying he would go to Korea.Only different.

SACRAMENTO (AP) - Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and legislative leaders met Tuesday for the first time this year, discussing numerous issues including ballot measures the governor wants voters to approve in a special election this fall. Although both sides have traded biting comments for weeks, Tuesday's events were more conciliatory, including Schwarzenegger kissing Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez during a bill-signing ceremony. Nunez, a Democrat from Los Angeles, called the meeting productive and joked about Schwarzenegger's embrace, which came only a few minutes after he had lashed out at the governor during a rally with education supporters on the Capitol steps. Such...

BEIJING, Nov. 24 (Xinhuanet) -- The Himalayan region of Kashmir remains at the center of decades-long rivalry between India and Pakistan. Both South Asian nuclear powers claim the divided region and the subsequent conflict has hampered efforts to spur economic growth in an area where a fifth of the world's populations live. Both India and Pakistan have been receptive to the possibility of ending hostilities. About a thousand Indian soldiers withdrew from the Indian-controlled Kashmir last week and another unit pulled out on Monday. The reduction in troop numbers, set to continue until the end of next March, is seen...

From Henry Mark Holzer's email newsletter: Kerry smeared a hero: my dad. > By CAROL CROWLEY >Published on: 09/20/04 > Many of you believe dirty politics is the motivation of Vietnam >veterans speaking out in opposition to John Kerry. Let me tell you the real motivation. > >In the movie "We Were Soldiers," the story about the battle of the la >Drang Valley in Vietnam in 1965, a young sergeant, Jack Gell, cried as >he died, "Tell my wife I love her . . ." and my family relived the >death of my dad. He told my mother in letters...

Letter to John Kerry: It's a Matter of Honor, Sir Written by Arnold Beizer Friday, October 15, 2004 Letter to Candidate John Kerry Dear Sir: We all know you have failed and neglected to sign Form 180 authorizing release of all your military service records as President George W. Bush has done, despite your broken promise on national television to news reporter Tim Russert to do so. Instead, you have repeatedly stonewalled on this character issue and left a question of honor on the minds of every American. You have called your own honesty into question by refusing to be...

Mystery Surrounds Kerry's Navy Discharge BY THOMAS LIPSCOMB - Special to the Sun October 13, 2004 An official Navy document on Senator Kerry's campaign Web site listed as Mr. Kerry's "Honorable Discharge from the Reserves" opens a door on a well kept secret about his military service. The document is a form cover letter in the name of the Carter administration's secretary of the Navy, W. Graham Claytor. It describes Mr. Kerry's discharge as being subsequent to the review of "a board of officers." This in it self is unusual. There is nothing about an ordinary honorable discharge action in...

NAIROBI, Kenya - The Sudanese government canceled plans to attend scheduled peace talks in Geneva next week with western rebels, officials said Wednesday, just days after the president proclaimed military victory in the insurgency. On Monday, President Omar el-Bashir said the military was "in full control" of the troubled Darfur province in western Sudan and offered amnesty to surrendering rebels. The army recently has announced several successes over the rebel groups in fighting near the border with Chad. Peace talks between the government and two rebel groups, the Sudan Liberation Army and the Justice and Equality Movement, were scheduled to...

NEW DELHI: India and Pakistan have agreed to hold three-day talks beginning February 16 in Islamabad to commence the process of composite dialogue. The talks will first be held at the level of joint secretaries on February 16 and 17 followed by a one-day meeting between the two Foreign Secretaries on February 18, External Affairs Ministry spokesman Navtej Sarna announced on Tuesday. A similar announcement was made by Pakistan Foreign Office spokesman Masood Khan in Islamabad. Official sources here said that during the three-day talks, the two sides would discuss the modalities for the composite dialogue . Ending more than...

JERUSALEM : Israel has given Turkey a green light to help revive peace talks with Syria , though it is unaware of any concrete plan for Turkish mediation and would favour direct contacts with Damascus . "The Turkish government has expressed its willingness to facilitate, but I do not know of any concrete proposal right now," Raanan Gissin, media spokesman to Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, said on Israel TV's Channel One on Saturday night. Turkey has passed messages between Jerusalem and Damascus in the past and would be welcome to do so again, he said. "We have good relations with...

Israel should very seriously consider remarks made recently by Syrian President Bashar Assad onresumption of peace talks between the two countries, military Intelligence Chief Aharon Ze'evi Farkash told the cabinet on Sunday. "Syrian President Bashar Assad's remarks regarding negotiations with Israel are very serious," Farkash was quoted as saying byIsrael Radio. According to the general, Assad's gesture was in response to Washington's pressure on Damascus, the present US control over Iraqand an interest in taking advantage of the standstill innegotiations between Israel and the Palestinians. Meanwhile, Farkash accused Syria of continuing to fund Palestinian terror organizations and the Lebanese Hezbollah...