Posted on 11/05/2009 8:06:47 PM PST by bruinbirdman
Middle East peace hopes were dealt a blow on Thursday when Mahmoud Abbas, the moderate Palestinian leader, announced he would stand down within weeks.
He expressed frustration over shifts in the White House's policy on Israeli settlement construction as he told colleagues he was not prepared to seek a second term in elections in January.
The loss of one of the Palestinian hierarchy's most conciliatory voices left President Barack Obama's Middle East peacekeeping efforts floundering and raised questions about his handling of negotiations in the region.
Critics say the US president has fatally undermined Mr Abbas by conceding political ground to Israel and pressuring him into taking unpopular decisions.
Although Mr Abbas has threatened to resign as president of the Palestinian Authority in the past, officials from his Fatah party said that there was no questioning their leader's intent on this occasion.
"President Abbas said more than once that he does not want to be a candidate because of his feelings of great frustration about the American position on the peace process," said Nabil Shaath, a senior Fatah official.
The Palestinian leadership feels betrayed by Mr Obama over the American "softening" of its position on settlement building in what many Arabs saw as an attempt to placate Israel.
It was initially encouraged by a call from the US president to freeze all Jewish settlement construction in the West Bank. In turn, it made Israeli fulfilment of his demand a central precondition for the resumption of peace negotiations. But Mr Obama has since tempered his position, asking Israel to show restraint in its settlement building rather than demanding a total freeze.
Visiting Jerusalem on Saturday, Hillary Clinton, the US secretary of state, praised Israel for an offer to limit settlement construction – although it falls far short
(Excerpt) Read more at telegraph.co.uk ...
Abbas did not want peace as he never gave Ehud Olmert an answer after Olmert wanted to give him everything back to 1967 Borders and internationalize Jerusalem.
I think he will have to step down, because if he even shows his face, the Palestinians will denounce him. He never got over the Hamas election victory.
Which terrorist SOB will take over next?
Fatah is the “Punk ass Prison Bitch” of Hamas now...
All the Rockets and mortars siezed by the Israelis from the
Iran terrorist supply Boat...shoud be given to the Jewish Soldiers to use freely without restrictions for killing any
“percieved” threat from Hamas...Day or Night.24/7.
with “extreme predjudice” and total immunity.
There’s this Palestinian guy in an ICU in Texas who isn’t going to back to his old job any time soon....
THIS is Series! We had better shag Jimmy Carter’s butt over there right away to set things right!
Don't see the submarine driver in the Holy Land much these days.
yitbos
Oh, that's right, his buddy Yasihadaids Arafat croaked. And his faux wife Shua isn't around to smooch Hillary.
yitbos
If you’d like to be on or off, please FR mail me.
..................
Actually, he offered him the same land mass as the 1967 borders, in other words swapping bits of the Negev in exchange for keeping existing “settlements” in place. Abbas refused unless he first unconditionally recognized Pali authority over the area within the 1967 borders, and then started negotiating the swap. In other words, give us some time to murder settlers before we turn down the offered swap.
If this is a moderate, it’s no great loss.
The guy who engineered Black September (or was it October?) in Jordan. I forget his name.
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