(Hat Tip ~ Selpaw)
AKA The Galled Bladder of Zion
(IsraelNN.com) Israeli officials are worried about a set of so-called “benchmarks” presented last week by U.S. diplomats that would be used as steps toward final status negotiations with the Palestinian Authority.
As before, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will fly to the region, this time on May 15th to drag the powerless PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas and unpopular Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert back to the bargaining table to enforce the implementation of those benchmarks.
The eight-month timeline calls for a series of steps that resemble the “confidence-building measures” laid out in the tattered Road Map plan, another U.S. initiative which Israel began to carry out and the PA basically ignored.
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert already tentatively agreed last week to comply with America’s latest laundry list, according to the Reuters news agency. U.S. officials said the PA had also agreed to carry out the plan, which is set to begin this month and carry on through December.
Neither Israel nor the PA, however, has officially responded to the document, which becomes a binding contract if both sides formally accept it.
Israeli officials are deeply concerned about the viability of the plan, authored by U.S. Security Coordinator Keith Dayton, U.S. Ambassador to Israel Richard Jones and U.S. Consul-General in Jerusalem, Jacob Walles.
The benchmarks include a deadline by which Israel will allow PA bus and truck convoys to shuttle between Gaza and PA-controlled areas of Judea and Samaria.
Israel is also expected to remove the security roadblocks in Judea and Samaria and extend operating hours at the major border crossings with Gaza.
More ominous, Israel will be forced to provide arms, ammunition and equipment to PA security forces in an “immediate and ongoing” manner, whenever U.S. Maj.-Gen. Dayton “requests” it.
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See Also:
Here
Here,
and Here
Rice Walks In, Iranian Envoy Slips Out
Update:
Reader Realwest's Letter to President Bush:
Dear President:I've been a fervent and faithful believer in you and in your attempts to do what's right for America, since the year 1999. In spite of some differences of opinion with you, on certain very specific issues such as immigration, I have always stood up for you and HONESTLY believed you have been trying to protect us all from the barbarians in the Middle East.When Speaker of The House Nancy Pelosi made her trip to Syria, I wrote all my friends and to every organization with which I have had any contact at all to protest this usurping of Presidential power. I even mentioned the Logan Act.I have of course realized how constrained you are, and perhaps justifiably so in the eyes of our Founding Fathers, by Public Opinion as to what may or may not be possible in foreign affairs.NOW I read where Secretary of State Rice may meet (obviously with your blessings) with Syria, since, apparently Syria is reducing it's assistance to the "foreign fighters" who are killing Americans in Iraq.I just HAD to tell you that you are both morally and politically wrong for allowing this meeting to even be discussed, much less occur.1. Syria - by our government's own statements has been and continues to be (perhaps more slowly than before, but still at it) enabling other people to kill Our Troops - Your troops as Commander in Chief. Sir, that is morally unconscionable.2. By allowing even the discussion of such a meeting, you - and I emphasize YOU -have made Nancy Pelosi the de facto President of the United States. She goes to Syria and many, many people complain about that - including your adiministration. The Syrians, of course, rejoice in the fact that they are no longer as isolated by the US, else why would Speaker Pelosi visit them? Then YOU turn around, FOLLOW Speaker Pelosi's ill conceived and morally wrong visit to Syria by authorizing your own Secretary of State to discuss having meetings with Syria. Politically you have just handed the Democratic Party a MAJOR victory domestically ("see, Pelosi LEADS, Bush follows") and may just in fact have turned over, at the least, our foreign policy leadership in the middle east to the Democrats for which they will have NO legal or political responsiblity over the outcome. IF it turns out badly YOU will be blamed; if Ms. Rice gets anything of aid to the United States out of her meeting with Syria, the Democrats will get the credit.I honestly don't know who is advising you on political matters but whoever it is is totally incompetent. On the Moral Issue of meeting with those who are actively engaged in enabling the murder of American troops, the good Lord knows who is your guide.
