Enlarge imageBy Sue Pleming
JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israeli leaders told U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Sunday that any deal Washington hoped to broker for a Palestinian state would not be implemented until Israel’s security was assured.
Rice, on her third visit in six weeks to the region, is trying to bridge gaps between both sides ahead of a U.S.-hosted conference expected in the last week of November in Annapolis, Maryland, although no official date has been announced.
Israel and the Palestinians are still at odds over a joint document for the conference, which would serve as a launch pad for negotiations on core issues such as borders and the fate of Jerusalem and millions of Palestinian refugees.
Advertisement starts
Advertisement ends
Israel has insisted that any future agreement be put into effect only after the Palestinians met their obligations under a U.S.-backed peace "road map" charting reciprocal steps towards statehood.
The 2003 blueprint requires Palestinians to crack down on militants and for Israel to halt the expansion of Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank and remove dozens of outposts set up without Israeli government permission.
"They (the Palestinians) need to understand that the implementation of future understandings would be implemented only according to the phases of the road map -- the meaning is security for Israel first and then the establishment of a Palestinian state," Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni told reporters, with Rice at her side.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, who will see Rice on Monday, said in a speech in the West Bank city of Ramallah that Palestinians had abided by 90 percent of the road map requirements and now "Israel must do its part".
Abbas’s Fatah faction holds sway only in the West Bank after losing control of the Gaza Strip to Hamas Islamists in fighting in June.
COMPLICATIONS
Livni, Israel’s chief negotiator for the conference, said the Jewish state was prepared to move forward in discussions with the Palestinians, although the situation was "complicated ... more than ever".
On her flight to Israel, Rice told reporters it was unlikely there would be agreement on a document during her two-day trip.
Rice, who later had a working lunch with Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, told Livni she hoped her visit would help to "advance the work you are doing bilaterally with the Palestinians as well as continuing to plan for the Annapolis meetings".
Commenting on Rice’s talks with Olmert, an Israeli government official said they spoke about preparations for the conference and "adhering to the principles of the road map as a basis for progress between Israel and the Palestinians".
At a meeting with Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak, Rice was introduced to a cabinet minister whom he described as someone who supported peace efforts. Rice responded: "I’ll take all the help I can get."
Israel and the Palestinians are also at odds over Abbas’s call for a timeline to wrap up so-called "final-status" negotiations for creating a Palestinian state.
Olmert opposes a timeframe, cautioning that a failure to meet deadlines could deepen frustrations and touch off violence. But he has said it is his goal to reach an accord before U.S. President George W. Bush ends his second term in January 2009.
