Rice, Abbas urge resumption of talks
Middle East Desk Report

RAMALLAH (West Bank)—Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas declared Tuesday that peace is his first choice in the Mideast and visiting Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice exhorted Israel to “spare innocent life” in the latest upsurge in fighting in Hamas-ruled Gaza.
“I call on the Israeli government to halt its aggression so the necessary environment can be created to make negotiations succeed, for us and for them, to reach the shores of peace in 2008,” Abbas said. He was referring to the goal — stated at a U.S.-sponsored Mideast peace conference in November — of reaching an Israeli-Palestinian peace treaty by the end of the year.
Abbas made his comments in a joint news conference here with Rice.For her part, Rice said: “I know that there is great will to try and get to a solution by the end of the year. What we are trying to achieve is not easy ... but I do believe it can be done. We need very much for everybody to be focused on peace,” she added.
Referring to the opponents of peace, she said, “We won’t let them win.” Rice also said that Israel should make “a very strong effort to spare innocent life” in Gaza. Earlier, the U.S. official said that walking away from talks plays into the hands of militants, and Rice blamed Palestinian Hamas radicals for provoking an Israeli military onslaught in the Gaza Strip. The campaign has derailed an already troubled U.S-backed drive for peace terms this year. “Negotiations are going to have to be able to withstand the efforts of rejectionists to upset them, to create chaos and violence, so that people react by deciding not to negotiate, “ Rice said in Egypt at the start of two days of efforts to rescue negotiations. “That’s the game of those who don’t want to see a Palestinian state established.”
The moderate, U.S.-backed Palestinian leadership in the West Bank suspended peace talks in protest after an Israeli military offensive that killed more than 100 Palestinians in Gaza. That made restoring two-way talks Rice’s chief objective for a trip she had planned to check up on the negotiators’ progress.
Israel launched the offensive to stop rocket attacks by the Hamas militant groups on nearby Israeli cities, but the assault prompted Abbas to suspend negotiations. Israeli aircraft sent more missiles crashing into Gaza on Tuesday after more rockets were fired on the southern town of Sderot.
“The people who are firing rockets do not want peace,” Rice told reporters in Cairo. “They sow instability, that is what Hamas is doing.” Rice backed Israel’s right to respond to the rocket fire, but said it must avoid causing civilian casualties.
“The rocket attacks against innocent Israelis in their cities need to stop. This can’t go on. No Israeli government can tolerate that,” she said. But the Israelis “need to be aware of the effects of these operations on innocent people.”
She said Hamas, which took over the Gaza Strip last July, is armed “in part” by Iran and underlined the need for the United States and the West to train and develop the Palestinian security forces loyal to Abbas, whose government controls the West Bank.
“Hamas gets armed by the Iranians and if nobody helps to improve the security capabilities of the legitimate Palestinian Authority security forces. That’s not a very good situation,” she said at a news conference with Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit. Rice said she still thinks the two sides can reach a deal for Palestinian statehood this year.
“I do think that negotiations ought to resume as soon as possible,” Rice told reporters Monday on her way to the Middle East. “I understand that the situation has been complicated. But the longer the negotiations are not ongoing or the longer that they are suspended, if that’s what one wants to call it, the more it is a victory for those who don’t want to see a two-state solution.”