MIDDLE EAST: Both Israelis and Palestinians sceptical ahead of Abbas-Olmert meeting

Israel and the Palestinians step up security ahead of a key summit in the West Bank while residents say they do not believe that the meeting will result in significant breakthroughs. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister will hold their second meeting since Hamas won parliamentary elections in March 2006 later on in the day. Israeli and Palestinian police and soldiers tightened security on Monday (August 6) ahead of a key summit in the West Bank, a meeting that doesn't seem to raise much hopes for significant change among Israeli and Palestinian residents. Israeli troops blocked all roads leading to the town of Jericho where Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert will meet with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, and Palestinian security men were guarding to seal the compound. The two leaders are expected to open talks on broad "principles" for a Palestinian state ahead of a conference later in the year. But Israeli and Palestinian civilians across the region seemed to have little hope that another series of talks would bring about a genuine change to the battered region. Khadder, a resident of Hebron, expressed some hope for the meeting to produce some new agreements by saying: "It will be good. I wish that this meeting will reach good agreements for the benefit of the Palestinian." But Kamel Amar, another resident of Hebron, was more skeptical. "We feel that these meetings with Olmert or any other Israeli leader will not reach any solution, because Israel constantly finds a new issue to discuss with Palestinians to gain more time, and I think it will get nowhere," Amar told Reuters Television. Israelis were also restrained regarding expectations of the summit. "Alot of people I think on both sides are just thinking that these meetings are just useless and I think if they want to meet they should meet, they should also make action and do something with this meeting and right now I don't see it happening," said Guy in the coastal Israeli city of Tel Aviv. "They will talk and there would be another meeting and another meeting but without any real results," added Mihal, another resident of Tel Aviv. After months of resistance, Olmert agreed to expand the scope of discussions with Abbas to include "fundamental issues" that are key issues for creating a Palestinian state and ending the conflict, U.S. and Palestinian officials said. Palestinian officials said Olmert would be the first Israeli prime minister to travel to a Palestinian city in more than six years. Olmert's office declined to spell out which key issues would be on the agenda. But Abbas aide Saeb Erekat said they were three so-called final status issues of common borders and the status of Jerusalem and Palestinian refugees. An Israeli government spokesman said most of the meeting would be one-on-one and focus on "how to arrive at the two-state solution". "This meeting is another important event I think in the process of Israeli-Palestinian reconciliation. We've had in the two-three weeks a number of important moves: the economic cooperation has been re-established, security dialogue is back on, the political meetings at the top level are continuing and I think we have to take the current momentum and strengthen that and that's why this meeting today is important," added Israel's Foreign Ministry Spokesman Mark Regev in Jerusalem. Previous talks between Abbas and Olmert were largely restricted to financial and security issues and to creating a so-called political horizon, which Israel defined as the legal, economic and governmental structures of a Palestinian state. Israeli officials said the goal was to reach agreement on a set of common principles on borders, refugees and other key issues without filling in the most divisive details, such as which Jewish settlements would have to be uprooted. The last round of final status talks broke down six years ago and Israeli officials stressed that the talks getting under way between Olmert and Abbas on Monday would fall far short of a resumption of final-status negotiations. If Olmert and Abbas agree on "principles", they will be presented to a U.S.-sponsored conference expected to be held in November, Israeli and Western officials said. Olmert and Abbas would then set up working groups to begin negotiating the details. Seeking Arab support to contain bloodshed in Iraq and counter Iran's nuclear programme, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is pushing for progress on the Palestinian front in President George W. Bush's last 17 months in office. But it is unclear whether Olmert, whose popularity plummeted after last year's inconclusive war in Lebanon, can make major concessions, particularly to uproot settlements. It is also uncertain how Abbas can deliver on any deal with Hamas Islamists, whose charter calls for Israel's destruction, in control of the Gaza Strip.

ITN Source | August 6, 2007

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