[Washington Post] Glenn Kessler - Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice announced Monday after meeting with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak that Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas would meet with her for a three-way informal discussion of issues that must be cleared away to establish a Palestinian state. No date or location has been set for the gathering, but it would signal deepening involvement by the Bush administration in stalled Israeli-Palestinian peace talks. Rice said she was going "to try to help the parties come together, to look at how they can move through the road map." The road map set out detailed sequential steps which, among other things, required the Palestinian government to crack down on anti-Israeli radical groups. Rice hopes to use the prospect of renewed U.S. involvement in the Middle East peace process to help win Arab support for the Iraqi government and a campaign to combat the rising influence of Iran.
2007-01-16 01:00:00Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive