"Arabs returning from summit uneasy, skeptical of future" by Jeffrey Fleishman/Los Angeles Times November 29, 2007
CAIRO - This week's Middle East conference in Annapolis, Md., has highlighted Arab unease over the ability and will of a weak US president to deliver peace and fears that Israel has scored a public relations coup while refusing to concede on such core issues as the status of Palestinian refugees and the fate of Jerusalem.
So what? Bush said he was happy with it!
Arab nations, most notably Syria and Saudi Arabia, had been reluctant to attend the US-sponsored talks, which set the framework for future Israeli-Palestinian negotiations. Now, with their prestige on the line, Arab officials are returning to their capitals with two tasks: convincing their populations that the summit was a crucial step toward a Palestinian state and keeping pressure on the United States and Israel to deliver progress.
That's a laugh!
It is a politically risky situation marked by skepticism and mistrust as well as occasional resolve. Arabs were encouraged that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was, at least temporarily, moved to center stage. But turmoil in Lebanon, war in Iraq, and a rising Iran have complicated Middle East politics beyond the nuances of what unfolds between Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and moderate Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas. Such instabilities, however, are often inextricably linked to a lasting Israeli-Palestinian peace.
Yeah, like Israel has nothing to do with it!
Arab capitals worry that if Abbas is perceived to have gained little from Annapolis, it will strengthen Iranian-backed militant groups, such as Hamas in the Gaza Strip and Hezbollah in Lebanon. One of the major reasons Sunni Arab countries, such as Saudi Arabia, agreed to participate in the summit was to counter Iran's political involvement across the region, including its alliance with Syria and influence in Iraq.
It was ALL ABOUT IRAN, folks!
Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al Faisal:
"Stagnation in the peace process has increased the appeal for extremist ideologies. Feelings of despair and frustration have reached a dangerously high level. It is time to bring this conflict to an end and to enable the people of the region to divert their energies from war and destruction to peace and development."
That doesn't sound like war-mongering, killer Arabs, dammit!
In fact, they even sound reasonable!
State-controlled Iranian media seized on the Annapolis conference to assert that neither an Israeli-Palestinian peace nor a wider Middle East calm were possible without the blessing of Tehran, which Washington did not invite to the summit, partly in protest of Iran's nuclear enrichment program. Also not invited were Hezbollah or Hamas, which took military control of the Gaza Strip in June from Abbas's Fatah movement. The violence erupted after Fatah refused to accept Hamas's victory in parliamentary elections.
I'm surprised they told the truth about that!
Iran's hard-line Kayhan daily wrote:
"The US-hosted peace conference has been heavily overshadowed by Iran and its powerful allies, and as a result no specific goals are expected to be achieved by the conference. This is another victory for Iranian diplomacy."
Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad told reporters yesterday:
"[When Hamas], the real representatives of the Palestinian nation and Palestinian resistance groups, did not attend the meeting and the rights, votes, and will of this nation were not recognized, the conference would be fruitless."
Some Arab commentators, however, sought to downplay the tensions between Shi'ite-dominated Iran and its Sunni neighbors, fearing that bickering among Muslim governments would shift attention from Israel's decades-long suppression of Palestinian aspirations."
And CUI BONO, readers!??
