Israel settlement surge draws Rice criticism | Reuters - August 2008 |

RAMALLAH, West Bank (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice called on Israel on Tuesday not to undermine peace talks with the Palestinians after a report found it had nearly doubled Jewish settlement construction.

On her seventh visit this year in a long-shot push for a peace deal by January, Rice said the two sides were "somewhat closer" in their talks despite deep public skepticism about the chances of ending the six-decade conflict.

Rice offered no further details, but said: "God willing, and with the goodwill of the parties and the tireless work of the parties, we have a good chance to succeed."

• Situation in the Middle East - Topics included violence in the Middle East, supporting the Lebanese government, establishing a humanitarian corridor, evacuation of 10,000 Americans and U.S. foreign policy | C-span |

At a joint news conference in the West Bank city of Ramallah, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas described the Bush administration as "determined" to reach a peace deal this year and said he hoped the next U.S. president would "continue what we have started".

Israel's Peace Now group, citing data from the Central Bureau of Statistics, said construction had begun on more than 443 structures in settlements in the occupied West Bank since January compared with 240 starts in the same period in 2007.

"The settlement activity is not conducive to creating an environment for negotiations," Rice said. "Yet negotiations go on."

Earlier in Jerusalem, after talks with Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, Rice said in reference to settlements that "anything that undermines confidence between the parties ought to be avoided".

Abbas described settlements as "the main obstacle" in the peace process.

Rice Urges Palestinians, Israelis To Fulfill Road Map Obligations (2005)

Palestinians say settlement building denies them land they want for a contiguous state. A U.S.-backed peace "road map" calls on Israel to halt all settlement activity in the West Bank and for Palestinians to rein in militants.

Remarks by the President to the United Nations General Assembly | 23 Sept. 2009|

I will also continue to seek a just and lasting peace between Israel, Palestine, and the Arab world.  (Applause.)  We will continue to work on that issue.  Yesterday, I had a constructive meeting with Prime Minister Netanyahu and President Abbas.  We have made some progress.  Palestinians have strengthened their efforts on security.  Israelis have facilitated greater freedom of movement for the Palestinians.  As a result of these efforts on both sides, the economy in the West Bank has begun to grow.  But more progress is needed.  We continue to call on Palestinians to end incitement against Israel, and we continue to emphasize that America does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements.  (Applause.)

The time has come -- the time has come to re-launch negotiations without preconditions that address the permanent status issues:  security for Israelis and Palestinians, borders, refugees, and Jerusalem.  And the goal is clear:  Two states living side by side in peace and security -- a Jewish state of Israel, with true security for all Israelis; and a viable, independent Palestinian state with contiguous territory that ends the occupation that began in 1967, and realizes the potential of the Palestinian people.  (Applause.)

As we pursue this goal, we will also pursue peace between Israel and Lebanon, Israel and Syria, and a broader peace between Israel and its many neighbors.  In pursuit of that goal, we will develop regional initiatives with multilateral participation, alongside bilateral negotiations.

Transcript: Obama's Speech at AIPAC | June 4, 2008 |

General Assembly Votes Overwhelmingly to Accord Palestine 'Non-Member Observer State' Status in United Nations | 29 November 2012 |

Voting by an overwhelming majority -- 138 in favour to 9 against (Canada, Czech Republic, Israel, Marshall Islands, Micronesia (Federated States of), Nauru, Panama, Palau, United States), with 41 abstentions -- the General Assembly today accorded Palestine non-Member Observer State status in the United Nations.

"The moment has arrived for the world to say clearly:  enough of aggression, settlements and occupation," said Mahmoud Abbas, President of the Palestinian Authority, as he called on the 193-member body to "issue a birth certificate of the reality of the State of Palestine".

Indeed, following Israel's latest aggression against the Gaza Strip, the international community now faced "the last chance" to save the long elusive two-State solution, he said, adding:  "the window of opportunity is narrowing and time is quickly running out".

The Israeli newspaper "Haaretz" recently published an article by Moshe Arens, a Likud member of the Knesset who held the positions of Minister of Defense, Minister of Foreign Affairs, and Israel's ambassador to the United States.

The article came as an angry reaction to US President Barack Obama's statement in his recent speech at the United Nations: "Israel must acknowledge that the occupation cannot continue forever, and it will not be able to control the Palestinian territories forever."

Moshe Arens, Israeli statesman and mentor to Benjamin Netanyahu, dies at 93 | WaPo - 8 Jan. 2019 |

Additional reading ...

20 years of missed opportunity has undermined progress on Israel-Palestine peace and left millions trapped in poverty | Oxfam - 13 Sept. 2013 |

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President Obama deliver remarks to the Israeli people at the Jerusalem International Convention Center. March 21, 2013.

In his next UNGA speech, not a single word on Israel or Palestine ...

Remarks by President Obama to the United Nations General Assembly | 28 Sept. 2015|

American hypocrisy at the highest level of the White House

Two-state Solution Dissected

Barriers to Peace: Protected Values in the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict | Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung |

Developing an Israeli Grand Strategy toward a Peaceful Two-State Solution

Listening to President Sadat's speech at the Knesset in November 1977, it was clear that the Egyptian leader aimed at promoting negotiations that would lead to a peaceful Israeli-Palestine two-state solution. By negotiating the Camp David Accords of 1978, Sadat laid the foundations for such an outcome. Four provisions of the treaty made it evident that the only possible outcome of negotiations would be a two-state solution. These provisions were:

1. Negotiations on the "final status of the West Bank and Gaza...shall be based on all the provisions and principles of UN Security Council Resolution 242," which provided for Israeli withdrawal from territories occupied in June 1967.
2. If this was not clear enough, it was made evident that withdrawal from territories "will resolve, among other matters, the location of the boundaries and the nature of security arrangements".

3. Israeli withdrawal and negotiations on borders will lead to a solution that will "recognize the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people and their just requirements", which in Sadat's mind clearly referred to the Palestinian right for self-determination; and

4. In order to ensure that the final outcome will be inline with the wishes of the Palestinian inhabitants of the West Bank and Gaza, the Camp David Accords (1978) obliged the parties that "the agreement will have to be submitted to a vote by the elected representatives of the inhabitants of the West Bank and Gaza."

Anyone who read and understood the text of the Camp David Accords could guess that the only outcome by a process of negotiations would be either an agreement between Israel and a Jordan-Palestine Confederation, to which King Hussein and Chairman Arafat had committed in an agreement of February 1985, or if this would not be the case, would lead to an Israel-Palestine two-state solution.

Therefore, most former Heruth party Members of Knesset, who ideologically opposed a renewed partition of Eretz Yisrael (the Land of Israel), or the territory of the former British Mandate of Palestine, and in particular the leading members Yitzhak Shamir and Moshe Arens, either abstained or voted against the Camp David Accords.

The Likud in Power: The Historiography of Revisionist Zionism

Additional reading ...

Israel's Stern Gang Mailed Letter Bomb to White House, President Truman | Tikun Olam - 11 Oct. 2016 |