La secretaria de Estado de EE UU, Hillary Clinton, inaugura en Washington el encuentro entre el primer ministro israelí y el presidente palestino.
DAVID ALANDETE - Washington - 02/09/2010
La Administración del presidente de EE UU, Barack Obama, ha conseguido encauzar el reinicio del proceso de paz en Oriente Próximo al lograr el compromiso por parte del primer ministro israelí, Benjamin Netanyahu, y del presidente de la Autoridad Palestina, Mahmud Abbas, de que se reunirán de forma habitual cada quincena a partir de los próximos días 14 y 15 de septiembre, posiblemente en Egipto. La Casa Blanca ha renlazado las negociaciones en un encuentro a puerta cerrada en el Departamento de Estado, tutelado por la secretaria de Estado, Hillary Clinton.
Con el compromiso asumido hoy, anunciado por el enviado especial de la Casa Blanca a Oriente Próximo, George Mitchell, ambas partes consensuaron una serie de principios de negociación y aceptaron el calendario propuesto por Obama, que podría hacer coincidir la tercera reunión con la Asamblea General de la ONU, que se celebrará en Nueva York entre el 23 y el 30 de septiembre. El 26 acaba la moratoria de 10 meses impuesta por Netanyahu sobre la ampliación de asentamientos judíos en el territorio ocupado tras la guerra de 1967. Los palestinos han exigido que se prolongue esa congelación como un requisito para continuar con las negociaciones.
A la pregunta de por qué esta ocasión puede diferir de las intentonas de paz anteriores, Mitchell ha respondido: "Hay una obvia diferencia. El presidente Obama estableció ésta como una prioridad en su agenda, inmediatamente después de tomar posesión. Recuerdo que, en dos instancias anteriores, se acabó el tiempo". Se refiere Mitchell a las iniciativas de Bill Clinton en 2000 y de George W. Bush en 2007, ambas al final de sus presidencias. "Creo que este presidente [en referencia a Obama] tendrá éxito. Desde luego, ni el éxito ni el fracaso nos vienen ya dados. Pero si erramos, no será por falta de tiempo".
Previamente, antes de que comenzara el diálogo formal, Netanyahu ha propuesto que ambas partes acepten "concesiones mutuas y dolorosas". "Ustedes esperan que nosotros estemos dispuestos a reconocer el Estado Nación palestino, del mismo modo que nosotros esperamos que la ciudadanía palestina esté preparada para reconocer que Israel es el Estado Nación de los judíos", le ha dicho a Abbas. "Hay más de un millón de ciudadanos que no son judíos en nuestro Estado Nación judío, y nosotros les ofrecemos plenos derechos". Después de dos días de ataques del brazo armado de Hamás, el grupo islamista que controla políticamente la franja de Gaza desde 2007, Netanyahu ha destacado que el principal escollo que la parte israelí ve para alcanzar la paz es el de la seguridad de su país. Hamás no se está presente en Washington por decisión propia y porque Washington lo considerauna organización terrorista.
La anterior ronda de negociaciones, celebrada en EE UU en 2007, acabó sin ningún resultado concreto, debido a una campaña de lanzamiento de cohetes por parte de Hamás a centros de población israelíes, lo que provocó una ofensiva militar de Israel contra Gaza.
Hamás, precisamente, ha vuelto a buscar interrumpir las negociaciones con el asesinato de cuatro colonos judíos el pasado martes en Cisjordania. El presidente de la Autoridad Palestina, Abbas, condenó de inmediato el atentado.
"Consideramos que la seguridad es fundamental para ambos. Y nos comprometemos a no permitir que nadie cometa actos que finalmente mermen vuestra seguridad y nuestra seguridad", ha dicho Abbas a los israelíes. El presidente, además, ha detallado sus requerimientos a Israel para lograr a paz: la liberación de los palestinos detenidos en campañas militares, la retirada de los colonos de los territorios ocupados en 1967 y el final del embargo económico a Gaza, impuesto tras la victoria política de Hamás.
Ya en el acto de inicio oficial de las conversaciones, la secretaria de Estado, Hillary Clinton, ha expresado la confianza que impera en su Administración de que estas negociaciones pueden llegar a mejor puerto que las anteriores. "Esta es la hora de demostrar el liderazgo, la responsabilidad y el coraje necesarios para tomar decisiones difíciles", ha dicho. "No podemos imponer ni impondremos ninguna solución. Sólo ustedes pueden tomar ahora las decisiones necesarias para llegar a un acuerdo y asegurarle un futuro pacífico al pueblo israelí y al pueblo palestino".
Abbas ha comparado las nuevas negociaciones con un hito en las relaciones entre israelíes y palestinos: el intercambio de misivas de reconocimiento mutuo entre ambas partes, ocurrido por primera vez en la historia en 1993 y tutelado por el entonces president Clinton. Aquel presidente convocó a los líderes israelíes y palestinos a un encuentro en Camp David en 2000. La que ahora es secretaria de Estado estuvo presente en aquellas negociaciones, en calidad de primera dama. "Ya nos hemos sentado a esta mesa antes", ha dicho. "Y sabemos que el camino por recorrer es arduo".
By MARK LANDLER. Published: September 2, 2010
WASHINGTON — Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton formally reopened direct peace negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians on Thursday, acknowledging that “we’ve been here before, and we know how difficult the road ahead will be,” but expressing confidence that the core disputes separating the two sides can be resolved within a year.
In one small but hopeful early sign, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel and President Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority agreed to meet in the Middle East on Sept. 14-15, and then to hold talks every two weeks thereafter, according to George Mitchell, the Obama administration envoy for Middle East peace, wire services reported.
That would mean that a successive round of talks would fall just days after an Israeli freeze on new construction in the occupied West Bank is set to expire. Mr. Netanyahu has said he will not renew it; Mr. Abbas has hinted he cannot continue talking without an extension; efforts at a compromise were thus certain to be a central topic in Washington.
“I fervently believe that the two men sitting on either side of me, that you are the leaders who can make this long-cherished dream a reality,” Mrs. Clinton told the two leaders earlier.
Mrs. Clinton said that the United States would be an “active and sustained partner” during the negotiations.
The Israeli and Palestinian delegations sat across from each other beneath the twinkling chandeliers of the Benjamin Franklin Room in the State Department. After remarks by the leaders, they went behind closed doors to begin hashing out the familiar, but until now intractable, issues of how to carve a Palestinian state out of Israeli-occupied territory in the West Bank.
Mr. Netanyahu and Mr. Abbas both pledged themselves to be peacemakers, though each cited the issues that could keep them apart: security concerns on the part of the Israelis, particularly after the killing of four Israeli settlers, and Israel’s continued settlement construction, which the Palestinians insist must be halted in order for the talks to go anywhere.
Noting that they disagree on other core issues — which, in addition to security and settlements, include borders, the status of Jerusalem, and the rights of Palestinian refugees — Mr. Netanyahu said, “True peace, lasting peace, will be achieved only with mutual and painful concessions from both sides.”
Mr. Abbas called on Israel to stop building settlements and to lift its embargo on Gaza. He noted that “we’re not starting from scratch, because we had many rounds of negotiation between the P.L.O. and the Israeli government,” referring to the Palestinian Liberation Organization.
The Palestinians want the negotiations to start off from where they left off at the end of 2008, when Mr. Abbas was negotiating with the former Israeli prime minister, Ehud Olmert. Mr. Netanyahu, who leads a right-leaning coalition government, has rejected any preconditions for the talks.
It was a day of self-conscious history-making at the State Department. The Palestinian delegation entered the room first, chatting and browsing on their BlackBerrys as they waited for the Israelis. Twenty minutes later, the Israelis entered, taking their places and gazing at their Palestinian counterparts across a dusty-rose-colored carpet.
Mrs. Clinton paid tribute to the diplomats in the room, several of whom she noted are grizzled veterans of the process. Watching from behind was Dennis B. Ross, a senior White House adviser on the Middle East who helped run the Camp David negotiations for President Bill Clinton in 2000. Also at the table were seasoned negotiators like Mr. Netanyahu’s adviser on the process, Yitzhak Molcho, and Mr. Abbas’s chief negotiator, Saeb Erekat.
“The people sitting here have worked very hard for many years,” she said. “Now it’s time to get to work.”
Pesident Hosni Mubarak has offered to host subsequent rounds of talks in Egypt, though officials said he was pushing for Mr. Obama to take a direct personal role in the process.
The standing of Mr. Mubarak, 82, in the region is such that officials said the administration was eager to get direct talks going quickly, because his health is said to be fragile and the United States is worried about the uncertainty that will come after he is no longer on the scene.
Jordan is a crucial player because of the difficult question of how to secure its border with a new Palestinian state. Israel currently has troops along that frontier and would balk at withdrawing them without a guarantee that the border would not become a conduit for missiles that militant groups opposed to the peace process, chiefly the militant group Hamas, which could fire at Tel Aviv and other cities in Israel.
Previous attempts to involve Israel’s Arab neighbors in constructing a peace deal between Israelis and Palestinians have fared poorly. Mr. Obama’s most recent attempt, when he sought to win confidence-building measures from Israel’s neighbors like allowing Israeli carriers to fly over their countries, failed when Saudi Arabia and other Arab states refused.
But more recently, the Saudis pressed Mr. Abbas to agree to the direct talks, using their financial aid to the Palestinian Authority as a lever.
The Arab League also has put its stamp of approval on the negotiations.
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THE JERUSALEM POST, ISRAEL
By HILARY LEILA KRIEGER AND HERB KEINON. 09/02/2010 23:57
US envoy George Mitchell stresses framework will tackle all core issues at heart of conflict, Netanyahu and Abbas agree to hold another meeting on Sept. 14 and 15.
WASHINGTON - Israelis and Palestinians agreed to work out a framework agreement in the coming months as a first step to a peace treaty, US Middle East envoy George Mitchell announced Thursday. Mitchell stressed that the framework would not be an "interim agreement" - which the Palestinians have long resisted - but tackle all of the core issues at the heart of the conflict.
"The purpose of a framework agreement will be to establish the fundamental compromises necessary to enable them to flesh out and complete a comprehensive treaty that will end the conflict and establish a lasting peace between Israel and the Palestinians," he told reporters during the first day of direct talks between Israelis and Palestinians in 20 months.
The parties also agreed Thursday to hold another round of talks in mid-September.
The decision to begin work on a framework agreement - on the way to resolving all of the core issues within the one-year timeline laid out by the United States - is the first concrete decision to come out of the new round of negotiations.
They began with statements by US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and President Mahmoud Abbas in the Benjamin Franklin room at the State Department before the three held a plenary session with their staffs and then broke into a smaller session consisting of just Clinton, Mitchell, Netanyahu and Abbas in her private office. After that, Netanyahu and Abbas held a one-on-one discussion before being rejoined by their staffs.
Mitchell described the relationship between the two men as "cordial," adding, "I felt it was a very positive and constructive mood, both in terms of the nature of the interaction and in terms of the nature of the conversation that occurred." Mitchell declined to go into detail about the topics covered but did say that there was mention of core issues. He didn't spell out what they were, but they are generally understood to include security, borders, settlements, Jerusalem and refugees.
However, Mitchell cautioned that he wasn't suggesting that "a detailed and extended discussion or debate on these specific substantive issues" occurred during the talks.
He did note that another trilateral team had already convened to sort out the details of the next meeting, which is set to talk place on September 14 and 15 in the region.
Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, who visited Washington on Wednesday along with King Abdullah of Jordan to lend support to the nascent process, said that he would be willing to host the parties for another round of talks.
Many speculate they are likely to be held at the resort of Sharm el-Sheik.
In addition to more frequent lower-level meetings, Mitchell indicated that Abbas and Netanyahu would meet personally around every two weeks, a schedule first proposed by Netanyahu. The mid-September talks will include Clinton and Mitchell.
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GULF NEWS, ARAB EMIRATES
By Jumana Al Tamimi, Associate Editor. Published: 00:00 September 3, 2010
Dubai: As Palestinian and Israeli leaders re-launched their first direct talks in 20 months in Washington on Thursday, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton emphasised America's "full support" to the peace process, but added the White House cannot "impose measures" on the parties concerned.
The main work, Clinton added, must be done by both Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.
"We will be an active and sustained partner," Clinton said in her opening statement during the ceremony held at the State Department.
"But we cannot and we will not impose a solution. Only you can make the decisions necessary to reach an agreement and secure a peaceful future for the Israeli and Palestinian people," Clinton added. The positions of both sides, however, seemed far apart, as before. Yet, they pledged their seriousness to overcome decades of mutual hostility.
While Abbas urged Israel to end all colony-building activities on Palestinian land and lift the blockade on Gaza, Netanyahu stressed that an enduring peace was not possible without security assurances for Israel. "We call on the Israeli government to move forward with its commitment to end all settlement [colony] activity and completely lift the embargo over the Gaza Strip," Abbas said.
Achieving peace requires "concessions", Netanyahu said, adding he anticipates "difficult days before reaching" peace. Israeli refusal to freeze colony activity is a clear indicator that the Washington talks are doomed to failure, experts say.
"In my opinion, the place and date of the [upcoming] talks are not important," Mustafa Barghouti, MP and secretary-general of the Palestinian National Initiative, a reformist political party, told Gulf News. "What is important is the agenda of the talks and its basis. Until now, there is no basis for the [current] talks."
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