Revealed: This is why Obama is visiting Israel

 

End Of Days News

TEL AVIV – President Obama’s planned visit to Israel as soon as next month has already secured Israeli and Palestinian pledges to restart so-called land-for-peace talks, according to informed Palestinian and Israeli officials speaking to WND.

The officials disclosed the Obama administration told both sides the talks would be aimed at creating a Palestinian state in what is known as the 1967 borders, meaning an Israeli retreat from some of the strategic West Bank and possibly some eastern section of Jerusalem.

According to the informed officials, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu agreed that once the talks begin there will be a silent, undeclared freeze on all Jewish construction in the West Bank and eastern Jerusalem with the exception of what are known as main blocs – Maale Adumin, Ariel and Gush Etzion.

The officials said the White House was adamant that Israeli talks with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas begin regardless of the position of Hamas, which controls the Gaza Strip.

Still, the U.S. is supporting Qatar, Egypt, Jordan and Turkey in back door efforts to broker a national unity deal between Abbas and Hamas during the same time period that the Israeli-Palestinian negotiations are set to take place, the officials said.

There is already close coordination between the White House and likely incoming members of Netanyahu’s government coalition who are known to be sympathetic to creating a Palestinian state, primarily former opposition leader Tzipi Livni.

Further, WND was told that Livni and former Minister Haim Ramon are currently coordinating the renewal of talks with the PA’s chief negotiator, Saeb Erekat.

Regarding Jerusalem, the informed Israeli and Palestinian officials said the White House has been nonspecific other than to champion talks based on what is known as the Clinton parameters.

The formula, pushed by Bill Clinton during the Camp David talks in 2000, called for Jewish areas of Jerusalem to remain Israeli while the Palestinians get sovereignty over neighborhoods that are largely Arab.

WND previously reported Palestinians are building illegally in Jewish-owned areas of Jerusalem, changing facts on the ground that result in Arab majorities on certain neighborhoods.

The informed officials, meanwhile, said the White House expects the issue of Jerusalem to be a key impediment in reaching a deal and is therefore discussing the formation of an international committee to help smooth the process.

Previous Israeli-Palestinian talks saw the U.S. naming an envoy meant to broker between the two sides. According to the officials speaking to WND, the White House has expressed interest in naming an envoy but has doubts about whether such a point man will be successful.

The officials said the PA is pushing for a U.S. envoy while Netanyahu’s government is indifferent to the idea.

As a way to entice the PA back to the bargaining table, the White House agreed to release some $200 million in aid that it has withheld for months, said the officials. According to the officials, the deal with brokered with the Palestinians by incoming Secretary of State John Kerry.

This will be Obama’s first visit to Israel as president. In a cabinet meeting this past Sunday, Netanyahu said he and Obama have agreed to three main topics to be addressed during the visit:

Iran’s nuclear program, the insurgency in Syria and the future of talk with the Palestinians.

Read more at http://www.wnd.com/2013/02/revealed-this-is-why-obama-is-visiting-israel/#30Zs8U8huZKuLdqo.99
 

No new peace proposals in Obama visit to Israel – only Iran, Syria

End Of Days News

 

President Barack Obama is not coming to Israel to advance new proposals or break the peace talks deadlock with the Palestinians, the White House said Wednesday night, Feb. 6. US ambassador to Israel Dan Shapiro said earlier he was coming in the spring for consultation major issues: preventing a nuclear Iran and the collapse of the Assad regime in Syria – not to make demands. Working relations between Obama and Netanyahu were “excellent,” he said.

The US ambassador was answering a question by a Kol Israel national radio interviewer early Wednesday, Feb. 6. The US ambassador said the president does not expect to issue a joint statement after his talks with the Israeli prime minister, but sought to affirm the deep and strengthened ties between the US and Israel.

Shapiro: Obama’s visit would take place after the new Israeli government was in place.

debkafile: Obama’s forthcoming visit has abruptly strengthened the prime minister’s hand in the negotiations for a post-election government coalition and refocused its agenda from haggling on domestic issues to establishing a broad security-diplomatic front. Party leaders such as Yair Lapid (Yesh Atid) are already muting their demands for joining government.

debkafile reported Tuesday, Feb. 5:

The day Israel announced the posting of extra Iron Dome and Patriot anti-missile interceptors in its northern regions, Tuesday, Feb. 5, the White House in Washington disclosed that US President Barack Obama would be visiting Israel in the spring. The visit had been discussed when Obama phoned Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu on Jan. 28 to congratulate him on his success in Israel’s recent election.

The communique went on to say that the US president was coming to discuss issues of common interest such as furthering the peace process but added, the start of Obama's second term offers an opportunity to reaffirm Israel's close relationship with the US and to discuss major issues like Syria and Iran.”

debkafile translates this as referring to the chemical weapons in the hands of Syria and most likely Hizballah as well as Iran’s nuclear program. The date of his visit was not released.

debkafile’s sources have divided the White House bulletin into two parts: security and political.

The reference to Syria and Iran as the “major issues” to be discussed in the framework of the “close relationship” points to Washington and Jerusalem being on the same wavelength on the military actions taken by Israel in Syria last week and those still to come.

It is also a signal from the White House to Tehran, Damascus and Hizballah that in so far as those three allies are planning reprisals for those actions, they will find the United States standing behind Israel.

The IDF command’s announcement expanding the areas of northern Israeli under the anti-missile interceptor shield was released shortly before the White House communiqué and during Israel’s chief of staff Lt. Gen. Benny Gantz talks at US military chiefs in Washington.

According to the IDF bulletin, an extra Patriot missile interceptor and a third Iron Dome battery was deployed in Lower Galilee, a region which covers key towns north of Tel Aviv: Afula, Nazareth, Yoqn’am and Hadera. Batteries were posted earlier outside Haifa and areas of Upper Galilee closer to the Syrian and Lebanese borders.

The Israeli military command is therefore taking into account that some two million Israelis are potentially in danger of missile attack.

The Obama administration cannot be sure if the president’s visit, his first since 2008, will take place before or after a possible confrontation between Israel and Iran, Syria and Hizballah.

As for the political message, the White House announced the coming presidential visit on the day that the newly-elected Israeli Knesset held its first sitting in Jerusalem. It belied the propaganda pumped out by Netanyahu’s political foes throughout the election campaign, accusing him of souring ties with the Obama administration.

By announcing the coming visit at this time, President Obama showed the party leaders who are hanging tough in talks for a coalition government that Netanyahu has his confidence and support and the two leaders are in close rapport on major issues.
Last year, debkafile, alone of any other publication, disclosed that Obama and Netanyahu had reached an understanding to embark on regional initiatives in a spirit of partnership straight after the Israeli election.

President Obama’s trip will also include the West Bank and Jordan.