WASHINGTON, 9 April — The announcement that US Secretary of State Colin Powell will not arrive in Israel before Thursday or Friday sent many Mideast observers reeling with disbelief. The announcement seems to confirm rumors that Bush is allowing Israel’s Prime Minister Ariel Sharon extra time to ‘mop up’ in the Occupied Territories.
Bush’s spinmeisters were sent out to buffer the shock on the airwaves on Sunday, while it was announced that Powell’s first stop, Morocco, would include meetings with the country’s King Mohamed and Crown Prince Abdullah of Saudi Arabia.
Secretary Colin Powell said Sharon assured him Sunday that he was “trying to expedite” withdrawal of his troops in the occupied territories, but he gave no time frame.
“He did not give me a specific timetable of the withdrawal, but I know he is trying to expedite the operation, to get it over with as soon as possible. And we’ll see what happens in the next couple of days,” Powell said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”
The secretary made his remarks just hours before embarking on his decisive trip to the Middle East, fwhich will include stops in Morocco, Egypt and Spain.
A cease-fire, he said, “must be our goal.” But he acknowledged he is not sure he will obtain one. “I’m not going to come back with a peace treaty in hand. I may not even have a cease-fire in hand.”
Powell said on NBC Sunday, “I’m planning to visit Prime Minister Sharon Thursday or Friday,” adding he would hold the meeting whether or not the troops’ withdrawal has been completed.
On Saturday, President Bush told Sharon to withdraw his forces from the West Bank immediately, but Sharon has ignored the president’s request.
Powell and National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice, made multiple appearances on Sunday talk shows, saying the US administration understands the withdrawal cannot be completed in a day. “....It can’t be helter-skelter and chaotic,” she said.
Rice said on CNN’s “Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer” that Bush used the word “now” in his telephone conversation with Sharon on Saturday, when he demanded the withdrawal.
On CBS’s “Face the Nation,” she said, “The important point is to begin now, without delay. Not tomorrow, not when Secretary Powell gets to the region, but now.”
Speaking to NBC and “Fox News Sunday,” Powell said he would meet with Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat this week “if circumstances allow.” But he refused to commit to such a meeting. The administration has criticized Arafat for failing to publicly urge an end the Palestinian suicide-bombings in Israel.
The media drumbeat against the Palestinians, meanwhile, remains steady.
A.M. Rosenthal, former executive editor of the New York Times, wrote a nationally syndicated column that appeared in yesterday’s papers. “Jews, listen and you will hear the sound of breaking glass,” he said. “Breaking glass, burning synagogues, and diplomats making filthy anti-Semitic remarks mean that a sickening number of people around the world, many in high office, would have no great objections if the concentration camps arrived attain and would even take pleasure in speeding their coming.”
He omitted mentioning, of course, the concentration camps the Israelis have created for the Palestinians throughout the Occupied Territories.
“Most important,” concluded Rosenthal, “our souls will be made stronger and clearer if we show ourselves and the world that we indeed man it when we say ‘never again.’ It will no longer be a slogan but a way of life, belief and piety.”
“The longer Israel’s military campaign against Palestinian terror continues,” runs the lead editorial in yesterday’s Washington Times, “the clearer it becomes that the Bush administration has no coherent idea of how to react. To his credit, President Bush has stepped up his criticism of Yasser Arafat’s continued support for terrorism, and his rotten, bankrupt leadership, which has brought the Palestinian people to ruin.
“But, judging from Mr. Bush’s demand that Israeli withdraw immediately from Palestinian cities, the president fails to comprehend that, just as the Untied States is in a war for its own survival against Osama Bin Laden’s terrorist network, Israel is also fighting for its very survival.”
With such anti-Palestinian rhetoric flowing, is it any wonder that Americans are unaware of the ugly realities on the ground? A CNN-USA Today poll released last week found that 77 percent of Americans think Arafat should be treated as a terrorist.
Predictably, Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pennsylvania, told CNN he doubted whether Powell should meet with Arafat. Powell disagreed. “We have to maintain contact with Palestinians leaders,” he said, “and Arafat is their leader.”
