[New York Times] Helene Cooper - Bush administration officials, publicly lukewarm about the national unity government agreement, were angry with Abbas, saying the pact brings him closer to Hamas instead of bringing Hamas closer to Abbas. While Rice was angry about the Mecca deal, she said that she would nonetheless go ahead with the planned summit, but has warned Abbas that the U.S. would deal only with Palestinian government ministers who explicitly agreed to the three conditions: to recognize the right of Israel to exist, forswear violence, and accept previous Israeli-Palestinian accords. So what was supposed to be a summit that shored up Abbas in the eyes of the Palestinian people by discussing a future Palestinian state may now downgrade to one in which Abbas spends his time trying to defend the Mecca deal and convince the U.S. and Israel that he has not sold out to Hamas.
2007-02-16 01:00:00Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive