Rice Says U.S. Wants End To Palestinian "Humiliation"

Taken from Yahoo News, Wed Oct 11 2006

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said on Wednesday the United States would work hard to create a Palestinian state free of the "daily humiliation" of Israeli occupation.

Speaking at a dinner hosted by Palestinian-Americans, Rice said she was committed to the goal of a Palestinian state where the people lived in peace alongside Israel as proposed under the stalled U.S.-sponsored "road map" for Middle East peace.

"The Palestinian people deserve a better life, a life that is rooted in liberty, democracy, uncompromised by violence and terrorism, unburdened by corruption and misrule and forever free of the daily humiliation of occupation," she told a dinner organized by the American Task Force on Palestine.

"I believe there could be no greater legacy for America than to help bring into being a Palestinian state for people who have suffered too long, have been humiliated too long," added Rice, whose government is accused by Arab states of siding with Israel in the conflict.

Rice was in Israel and the Palestinian Territories last week, where she met Israeli officials and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in what the Bush administration says is a new drive to revive the moribund Middle East peace process and bring in moderate Arab leaders.

However, the trip did not appear to make much progress in attempts to bolster Abbas, who has failed to pull together a unity government with the militant group Hamas.

The United States has cut off direct aid to the Palestinian Authority since the election of Hamas last January, but has continued limited humanitarian assistance via aid groups.

"Either you are a peaceful political party or a violent terrorist group. You cannot be both," Rice said of Hamas.

She said the Quartet of Middle East peace brokers was holding firm to the principle that Hamas had to meet three obligations -- renounce violence, accept Israel's right to exist and recognize previous peace deals, including the U.S.-sponsored road map.

"I know that sometimes, a Palestinian state living side by side in peace with Israel must seen like a very distant dream but I know too ... that there are so many things that once seemed impossible that after they happened they simply seemed inevitable," she said.
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With it being President Bush last term as President, like all his predecessors, he is trying to fix a problem that no one has done before but is worth pursuing. Tony Blair likewise has already joined the bandwagon.

Bush’s Dream
According to a BBC programme in 2005, Abu Mazen, Palestinian Prime Minister, and Nabil Shaath, his Foreign Minister, describe their first meeting with President Bush in June 2003.

Nabil Shaath says: "President Bush said to all of us: 'I'm driven with a mission from God. God would tell me, "George, go and fight those terrorists in Afghanistan." And I did, and then God would tell me, "George, go and end the tyranny in Iraq" And I did. And now, again, I feel God's words coming to me, "Go get the Palestinians their state and get the Israelis their security, and get peace in the Middle East." And by God I'm gonna do it.'"

Abu Mazen was at the same meeting and recounts how President Bush told him: "I have a moral and religious obligation. So I will get you a Palestinian state."

So Bush is doing it through divine intervention, but Evangelist Christians in the US (who have a different agenda to Bush) are pumping millions of dollars to settle Jewish people (mostly from Eastern Europe) to Israel at the expense of Palestinians.

Do the parties in Palestine what peace with Israel? The answer is yes…

Mashaal okays state with 1967 borders
According to the Jerusalem Post (Oct. 12, 2006) Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal has told London-based Arabic daily Al-Hayat that he was willing to accept a Palestinian state within 1967 borders, as well as a hudna [truce] with Israel but not to recognize the "occupation."

Mashaal addressed reports Wednesday that said he had agreed to wide-ranging concessions in order to pave the way for a unity government in the Palestinian Authority. Although he refused to recognize the "legitimacy of the occupation," Mashaal admitted the "Zionist entity" was an established fact. "There is an entity whose name is Israel, yes, but I am not interested in recognizing it," said Mashaal.
The Hamas political chief also hinted at the possibility that his organization and the Hamas-led Palestinian government would recognize agreements with Israel the PA and PLO previously signed.

"I want to emphasize my right to resistance," Mashaal said. "As long as my people are exiled and my land is occupied, I have a legitimate right to resist the occupation." Mashaal

He noted that if the international community found a way to give the Palestinians back their rights without an armed struggle, Hamas would adopt such a course of action since, Mashaal claimed, the armed struggle was only a means and not an end.

What about the captured Israeli officer?
Mashaal said that Israel has so far rejected the principle of a prisoner exchange. Mashaal said the issue of Shalit would not be influenced by fears that Israel would try to "punish" the Palestinians after he is released. The only factor, he said, was to work for the release of as many Palestinian and Arab prisoners as possible. "What [we] require is the release of 1,000 prisoners, women and children," Mashaal said. "The prisoners issue is a sensitive one - it is a human and political issue. There are 10,000 prisoners. This is a national concern. No one will dare to yield on this issue."

Palestine is a prison
Despite Israel's pullout from Gaza, the territory's 1.4 million Palestinians remain hemmed inside a prison by an Israeli blockade backed by tanks and warplanes. International sanctions have brought hardship to government employees whose wages have been unpaid for months. Palestinians have also been without water and electricity (as these were taken away by the Israeli government. There have been a lot of attacks on Palestinians by settlers, and IDF soldiers do little to prevent this from happening.

EU aid to PA expands to $816 million
The European Union said recently that it was giving $816 million in aid to benefit 160,000 Palestinian families this year, expanding the funding program that bypasses the Hamas-led government.

European experts agreed to boost the international aid program overseen by the World Bank to cover 60,000 more families in the Palestinian territories from the 100,000 families now receiving help under the program, EU spokeswoman Emma Udwin said.

The fund offers a $339 monthly allowance to poorer Palestinian families, pensioners and civic workers, whose paychecks disappeared when international donors halted direct aid payments after the militant Hamas group won Palestinian elections.

"We are talking about quite a large amount of money," Udwin said. "Despite direct aid to the Palestinian Authority having been suspended .... the EU's contribution remains high, higher than in an average year."

Palestinians prevented from getting medical treatment
There is also the case of medication being prevented to the Palestinians. Haaretz newspaper published an article stating that the Shin Bet security service is systematically preventing Palestinians who need medical treatment unavailable in the territories from entering Israel, a new report by the nonprofit organization Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) charges.

According to the organization, in many cases, patients have been denied urgent, life-saving treatment. The report says that the Shin Bet automatically refuses entry permits, and reconsiders its decisions only if legal action is begun.

According to PHR, international law and agreements to which Israel is party require it to provide for the medical needs of the population in the territories. Israel refuses to acknowledge any such legal obligation, but responds to some requests out of "humanitarian concerns." In those cases, Israel charges the Palestinians for the medical treatment.

UN claims 40% growth in IDF roadblocks
These physical obstacles are carving up the West Bank into separate parts, with travel between them becoming more and more difficult, said David Shearer, head of the UN's Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in Jerusalem.

In Jerusalem, the UN agency, OCHA, said it has seen an increase of nearly 40 percent in the number of army checkpoints and physical barriers in the West Bank, from 376 in August 2005 to 528 in September of this year.

Israel is also pushing ahead with the construction of its separation barrier along, and in many areas inside the West Bank. The barrier will eventually run for 703 kilometers (437 miles), and 406 kilometers (252 miles) have been completed, of those 44 kilometers (27 miles) in the pasts five months, Shearer said.

Some 50,000 Palestinians find themselves on the wrong side of the barrier, meaning they are separated from the rest of the West Bank, Shearer said.

Israel accused of using 'Dime' bombs
A team of Italian journalists investigating Israeli weapons is claiming that an experimental weapon has been used against the Palestinians in recent months.

The weapon is believed to have caused more than 300 serious injuries leading to 62 amputations and 200 deaths between the months of June and July, doctors told Aljazeera.

Haaretz newspaper reported that the evidence in the Rai24 news investigation was based on witness accounts from doctors in the Gaza Strip, as well as tests carried out in an Italian laboratory.

Yitzhak Ben-Israel, major-general in the Israel air force, formerly head of the army's weapons-development programme, was also quoted in Haaretz as telling the Italian journalists: "One of the ideas [behind the weapon] is to allow those targeted to be hit without causing damage to bystanders or other persons."

Conclusion
Hamas and all the other Palestinian parties want the best for the Palestinians that includes manking any deal with the Israeli government. But when they are prevented finance, water and electricity supply to their people, medication, and the right to pray in mosques because of road blocks creating segregation, the right to live in Israel and return to their homes because Israel favours settlers from London, Moscow and New York, then there is little they can do than retaliate using force - after all their land is occupied by the Israeli's and they have aright to defend themselves - who else is going to look after their interests?

Peace proposals have always come and gone. When the PLO was in power, the Israeli government had a chance to work with a secular group that was easy to bargain with but they refused to co-operate. For one reason or another, the peace process would always be stalled by the Israeli government on the 11th hour, it will always be the same with Hamas or whoever is elected to represent the Palestinians unless the Israel withdraws its Zionist ideology. Bush will have to continue dreaming unless he takes action, teh last thing we need to see in the Middle-East is false promises.