US Seen Easing Israeli Settlement Demands

Source: Associated Press

(08-27) 15:58 PDT WASHINGTON, (AP) --

The Obama administration appears to be backing down on its insistence that Israel halt all settlement activity as a condition for restarting peace talks with the Palestinians.

While U.S. officials insist their position on the matter has not changed, they are now hinting that a less blanket moratorium would be acceptable provided the Palestinians and Arab states agree.

State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said Thursday that the U.S. "position in these discussions remains unchanged," but he added that the U.S. would be flexible on pre-negotiation conditions for all the parties involved.

"We put forward our ideas, publicly and privately, about what it will take for negotiations to be restarted, but ultimately it'll be up to the parties themselves, with our help, to determine whether that threshold has been met," Crowley said.

"Ultimately," he added, "this is not a process by which the United States will impose conditions on Israel, on the Palestinian Authority, on other countries," he added.


Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2009/08/27/national/w150843D56.DTL

Oh, yeah, why should I country stop breaking international law before we agree to kiss their ass? It's totally not helpful.

Try another point please, that one doesn't work.

We should take the same approach to Israel as we did to South Africa in the 80's.

Boycott the fuck outta them until they get humane.

This tunnel vision directed at Israel in every situation for everything Israel does or doesn't do is bizarre. Most of the settlements should be dismantled, but there were plenty of Jews living in East Jerusalem before '47, and when Jordan invaded that UN zone there was barely a peep from the international community. Nor was there a peep when those Jews were evicted and murdered.

There was no peep when the Arab nations, that some people seem to worship, evicted and in many cases exterminated their Jewish populations.

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If Obama actually wanted to halt them he would cut tie it to the billions of dollars in handouts they get from the U.S. Actions speak much louder words.