GAZA CITY, 29 September 2006 — Middle East peace received a push yesterday with the announcement of Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert that he would meet with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in a few days and US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice saying she would visit Israel and the Palestinian territories next week.
“I have told him (Abbas) that I am ready to meet him,” Olmert said in an interview with Israeli public radio.
“I do not set any conditions for the meeting but at the same time do not accept that conditions are imposed on me,” Olmert added.
But Olmert cautioned against expecting quick results, especially with Hamas running the Palestinian government. “I am making a very great effort to have a dialogue... I want to meet with him, we should start a process,” Olmert said in the interview. “(But) the distance is long... we don’t have to be hasty. How it will work out, how it will end, that we shall see.”
Olmert said he hoped the meeting with Abbas could be held in the coming days, although he gave no precise time frame.
His spokesman, Assaf Shariv, said no preparations had been made for any meeting. Senior Abbas aide Saeb Erekat said the Palestinian leader was ready to meet Olmert, adding he also was not aware of any preparations for talks.
Such a gathering would be their first formal summit since Olmert took over as Israeli leader in January when former prime minister Ariel Sharon was felled by a massive stroke. Peace talks collapsed in 2000 before the start of a Palestinian uprising and dimmed further when Hamas took office last March after trouncing Abbas’ Fatah movement in elections.
The Palestinians accuse Israel of giving Abbas the cold shoulder before Hamas won elections.
Some world leaders have said the recent war in Lebanon underscored the need for Israel and the Palestinians to resume peace talks to remove a major trigger for regional tensions. Abbas wants a negotiated two-state solution to end the conflict.
Olmert told Army Radio talks with Abbas should take place on the basis of the 2003 US-backed peace “road map.”
That plan has stalled with neither side meeting its obligations under phase one of the document — the Palestinians to start disarming militant groups and Israel to freeze building Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank.
In Washington, Rice said she will leave the US capital on Sunday and plans to visit Israel, the Palestinian territories, Egypt and Saudi Arabia, her first trip to the region since a July visit during the month-long war between Israel and Hezbollah.
The trip follows up on President George W. Bush’s UN General Assembly speech which promised that the United States would “go out, consult in the region... with those leaders who have a vision for a more moderate, democratic, stable and prosperous Middle East, State Department spokesman Sean McCormack told reporters.
Meanwhile, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Louise Arbor announced yesterday she would soon visit Israel and the occupied territories to study the “deteriorating situation.”
In a speech to the United Nations Human Rights Council, she also reminded both sides of their responsibility to uphold international humanitarian and human rights law, but declared that only a political solution could end the suffering. “Soon, I will have an opportunity to conduct a first-hand assessment of the situation,” Arbor told the 47-member state forum.
