Posted on 03/14/2010 6:21:26 AM PDT by SJackson
Clinton calls PM, slams construction plan; Quartet condemns Israel's action.
US Middle East envoy George Mitchell has promised the Palestinians that Israel will not construct new homes in east Jerusalem during peace negotiations, the London-based newspaper Al-Quds Al-Arabi reported Saturday.
According to the paper, Mitchell told Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas over the phone that Washington would provide the PA with guarantees that Israel would halt construction in the east of the city.
On Tuesday it was announced that 1,600 new apartments would be constructed in the east Jerusalem Jewish neighborhood of Ramat Shlomo. The announcement came during the visit of US Vice President Joe Biden and embarrassed Washinton, leading to harsh condemnations from Biden and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, and to Palestinians threatening to cancel planned indirect talks with Israel. Israeli government officials, including Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, have apologized for the timing of the announcement, although not for the building permits themselves.
The Arab report stated that Mitchell’s promise of guarantees was given after the Palestinians refused to accept Netanyahu’s apology as a signal that construction would not move forward.
Clinton sharply admonished Netanyahu over the Interior Ministry’s approval of the new building in east Jerusalem in a phone conversation Friday.
Her call came hours ahead of a condemnation of the housing plan issued by the Quartet of the US, UN, EU and Russia.
“The Quartet has agreed to closely monitor developments in Jerusalem and to keep under consideration additional steps that may be required to address the situation on the ground,” read its statement, which also called for the resumption of peace talks. The Quartet said it would “take full stock” of the situation at its meeting in Moscow on March 19.
In her call to Netanyahu, Clinton labeled the east Jerusalem announcement “a deeply negative signal about Israel's approach to the bilateral relationship,” one that went against the spirit of Biden’s trip to Israel this past week and “undermined trust and confidence in the peace process and in America's interests,” according to State Department spokesman PJ Crowley.
He said that Clinton also stressed that “the Israeli government needed to demonstrate not just through words, but through specific actions, that they are committed to this relationship and to the peace process.”
Biden wrapped up a four-day visit to Israel Thursday in which he repeatedly stressed the strength of the alliance and the US commitment to Israel’s security. When news broke Tuesday about the plans for building in Ramat Shlomo, he drafted a response in consultation with US President Barack Obama using the harshest diplomatic language to condemn the move.
The Palestinians, outraged by the new housing plans, have threatened to pull out of upcoming indirect talks with Israel if they aren’t shelved.
A State Department official speaking on condition of anonymity wouldn’t specify whether the US was looking for Israel to accede to the Palestinian demand when it came to the Ramat Shlomo project, but said, “We’d like to see the Israeli government take specific steps to build confidence.”
The Arab League, in a special meeting Wednesday, withdrew its support for indirect talks which it had endorsed just one week earlier. US Assistant Secretary for Near Eastern Affairs Jeffrey Feltman and Middle East Envoy George Mitchell have been working the phones to keep Arab leaders on board.
They spoke to the foreign ministers of Egypt, Jordan, Qatar and the UAE, as well as to Arab League Secretary-General Amr Moussa and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas as part of their outreach.
“We’ve been dealing with some obstacles this week, but we’re working with both sides to overcome those obstacles and keep the proximity talks moving forward,” the State Department official said. “We’re still moving forward with our plans.”
Crowley noted on Thursday that the US had not received any official word from the Palestinians that they were pulling out of the talks, despite media speculation, and that Mitchell was still planning on heading back to the region next week.
Also Friday, the State Department announced it was increasing assistance to Palestinians via the United Nations Relief and Works Agency by $55 million, bringing the total US expenditure for 2010 to $95 million.
During Clinton’s nearly 45-minute call with Netanyahu about the housing plan’s approval, she also told the prime minister “she couldn’t understand how this happened, particularly in light of the United States' strong commitment to Israel's security,” according to Crowley.
Netanyahu has insisted he was blindsided by the Interior Ministry committee vote and apologized for its timing, but he hasn’t walked away from the building program itself.
Asked whether the secretary’s comment indicated the Americans didn’t believe Netanyahu’s explanation, Crowley said that “we accept what Prime Minister Netanyahu has said.”
But he added, “By the same token, he is the head of the Israeli government and ultimately is responsible for the actions of that government.”
The length and unusually blunt tone of Clinton's call underscored the administration's concern about prospects for the negotiations it has been trying to organize for more than a year and its anger over Israel's refusal to heed U.S. appeals not to make provocative gestures.
"The announcement of the settlements on the very day that the vice president was there was insulting," Clinton said in an interview with CNN Friday. "It was just really a very unfortunate and difficult moment for everyone, the U.S., our vice president who had gone to reassert America's strong support for Israeli security, and I regret deeply that that occurred and made that view known."
Earlier Friday, an Israeli cabinet minister said the government is moving to amend the country's planning procedures on sensitive political decisions because of the embarrassing diplomatic flap. Netanyahu has said he was not aware the announcement was going to be made during Biden's visit.
Meanwhile on Friday, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas said he and Tunisia's leader, Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, have begun to discuss how the Arab League should respond to an Israeli plan for new construction in Ramat Shlomo.
Speaking during a visit to Tunisia, Abbas said Israel's move "got in the way of" plans to begin US-mediated indirect talks with Israel.
On Thursday, senior Israeli officials assessed that proximity talks with the Palestinians would begin soon. Their words came hours after US Vice President Joe Biden left Israel for Jordan.
According to the officials, Biden – in his speech at Tel Aviv University on Thursday – made it obvious that despite the row over the construction plans in northeast Jerusalem’s Ramat Shlomo neighborhood, the US was interested in “putting everything back on the rails.”
Biden told Al-Jazeera in an interview taped in Bethlehem on Wednesday that he expected that direct negotiations dealing with all the core issues would begin in about four months.
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Al Gore guarantees global warming, Bubba did not have sex with that woman. In the end I suspect the construction plans will be scaled down or canceled, the credit not to Mitchell but to the fool who engineered the announcement, caring more about political points than the people who might live in Rabat Shlomo. Of all people, he should appreciate the Obama administrations reaction.
How long will the liberal Jewish people in America continue to support barry?
Israel building homes for its citizens in Jerusalem. What a unique and novel idea. /s
Build baby build!!!!!
My heart aches over this!
Anyone who would like to Pray about this issue, I invite you to “Pray For the Peace Of Jerusalem”.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-religion/2470705/posts
Right now, we are studying Exodus, and even the Pharaoh’s advisers are urging him to “Let the people GO!”
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Obama is the most anti-Jewish president in US history (more than Franklin Roosevelt) and the most Israel (more than Dwight Eisenhower). He was spoiling for a fight in order to try and knock Israel off balance and he seized on this fake issue in his Chicago-style politics of destruction (and I am a Chicagoan). Israel never said it would suspend construction in Jerusalem, nor should it.
I pray that Israel recognizes the administration’s Islamic relignment for what it is and holds its ground in as diplomatic a way as possible.
I thunk everyone can see through the words (and, G-d forbid, actions) of the Obama administration to understand wht is really behind them: a wish for Israel’s destruction by Iran and the so-called “Palestinian” Arabs whose former leader, the grand mufti of Jerusalem, actively planned the mass murder of Europe’s Jews and even visited Auschwitz first hand while that killing machine was in operation.
Sorry for the typos. It is hard to correct them on a
BlackBerry.
The Israeli response to the Arabist Obamist hulabaloo should be:
"We are so sorry. We forgot a zero. We're going to build 16, 000 apartments, not 1600. And if you whine any more we'll make it 160,000."
The Jews of Israel are screwing up 0bama’s plans to suck up to the Moslem world. The world in thrall to a false prophet
By WHAT right does mitchell guarantee anything about Israel to anyone? What elected office does he hold in Israel that he can presume to speak for a sovereign nation he is no part of?
Arrogance is rapidly becoming a word that has outlived its usefulness in this administration. At this point, something far stronger needs to take its place even if we have to make one up. I can’t even think of a good Yiddish word to cover this.
Has Bibi finally regrown his spine?
How dare Jews live in Israel? The very idea! How funny that the liberals and towelhead sympathizers here call Israel an apartheid state but have nothing to say about the Palestinians establishing judenfrei areas for themselves.
The list, ping
Maybe I haven’t had enough caffeine yet, but I’m struggling to understand this. Has Israel actually canceled plans to build the 1,600 housing units? If the answer is yes, isn’t that an unmitigated disaster? Once you start letting foreign bullies supersede the best interests of your own people, it’s all downhill from there.
Prayers for Israel, and prayers for a backlash against this madness.
US Middle East envoy George Mitchell has promised the Palestinians that Israel will not construct new homes in east Jerusalem during peace negotiations, the London-based newspaper Al-Quds Al-Arabi reported Saturday. According to the paper, Mitchell told Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas over the phone that Washington would provide the PA with guarantees that Israel would halt construction in the east of the city.And, that's the end of Obama's diplomatic legitimacy with his fellow Moslems. Thanks SJackson.
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