The upcoming Middle East peace conference offers all sides a chance to "redouble their efforts" of achieving a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, U.S. President George W Bush said Sunday.
Bush said that the conference in Annapolis, Maryland Tuesday would offer a strong show of international support for Israeli and Palestinian leaders to restart peace talks and renew their commitment to the US-backed road map towards an independent Palestinian state.
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"I call upon all those gathering in Annapolis this week to redouble their efforts to turn dreams of peace into reality," Bush said in a statement. "I remain personally committed to implementing my vision of two democratic states, Israel and Palestine, living side by side in peace and security."
Bush will meet separately at the White House Monday with Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas, and also plans to address Tuesday's gathering in Annapolis.
U.S. National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley said Sunday that "it is now time for the parties to get into this process by way of negotiation", referring to the speech Bush is expected to present at the summit.
In a briefing to the press Sunday, Hadley said that "the President will probably decide that it is not the time for him to put out specific ideas on how to resolve any of these particular issues" - namely borders, Palestinian refugees and Jerusalem.
Two days before the summit, Hadley repeated the messages that the Bush administration has been voicing for several weeks. He emphasized the role of the road map for peace in the process, and said that "the focus of these discussions are the Israelis and the Palestinians launching a negotiating process, supporting them in their efforts to implement the road map, which we still think is the critical path for achieving peace, and, in parallel, building Palestinian institutions and making sure there's international support for that."
Hadley promised that the U.S. will "be a witness and, in some sense, to facilitate the efforts" by the sides to implement the roadmap.
Addressing a Syrian announcement earlier Sunday that the country would send a delegation to the conference, Hadley said that "the Golan Heights specifically is not on the agenda," echoing the position of both Israelis and Palestinians. However, he said, "there will be an opportunity for people to talk about" a comprehensive Arab-Israeli peace process.
Israel welcomed Syria's announcement, but stressed the Israeli-Palestinian conflict would be the main focus of the meeting.
Miri Eisin, a spokeswoman for Olmert, said Sunday "Israel sees in a positive way the high-ranking participation of Syria in a conference which is clearly about the Israeli-Palestinian track, but could open additional avenues to peace in the Middle East."
Government sources in Damascus said earlier in the day that Syria would send Deputy Foreign Minister Faysal Mekdad to the summit this week.
Syria had conditioned its participation in the summit on the inclusion of the future of the Golan Heights on the summit's agenda.
Syria's Information Minister Mohsen Bilal said Foreign Minister Walid Moallem had other commitments and Mekdad was more than qualified to represent Syria.
Bilal told Al-Jazeera TV that Damascus decided to attend to discuss the Palestinian issue, Israel's withdrawal from the Golan and the possibility of the resumption of the peace process. He did not elaborate.
In remarks to reporters made just after landing in Washington on Sunday, Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni said the future of the Golan Heights could come up in Annapolis negotiations.
Livni told reporters on the plane taking Prime Minister Ehud Olmert to Washington that, although the Golan was not formally on the agenda, participants could raise "whatever issues they want" in a forum due to discuss "comprehensive peace in the Middle East".
"As a result of the inclusion of this phrase, I believe Syria ... decided to attend the conference," Livni said.
Speaking about the importance of wide Arab participation, including Syria and Saudi Arabia, Livni added: "There isn't a single Palestinian who can reach an agreement with Israel without the support of the Arab world. This is one of the lessons we learned seven years ago."
"I think there will be a joint document ... this is the statement that will launch the (peace) process, not solve (the conflict)."
But Livni made clear that peace negotiations with the Palestinians after the summit would follow only a bilateral track: "The Arab world is not supposed to define the terms of the negotiations, nor be involved in them."
Commenting on prospects for a joint Israeli-Palestinian statement ahead of the conference, she said: "I think there will be a joint document ... this is the statement that will launch the (peace) process, not solve (the conflict)." The United States wants the conference to relaunch talks about creating a Palestinian state but Israeli and Palestinian negotiators have struggled to agree on a joint document ahead of the meeting.
The Bush administration decided to invite Syria to the Annapolis conference due to the Israel Air Force September strike on what foreign media have termed a Syrian nuclear facility, American officials said.
Arab League: Normalization only in framework of Arab peace plan
Arab officials departed for the United States on Sunday to attend the U.S.-sponsored Mideast peace talks in Annapolis, warning that there would be no normalization with Israel without a comprehensive peace.
"The Arab League will participate for the first time in a peace conference with an Israeli presence," Arab League Secretary General Amr Moussa said on his departure Sunday. "We will say that there can be no normalization except in the framework of the Arab peace initiative and in the framework of total peace."
"We will speak with all frankness and we will inform the world everything that happens at the conference," he added.
In a meeting Friday, Arab countries all agreed to attend Tuesday's peace conference at the ministerial level, a victory for the U.S., which is hoping that broad Arab participation will support their efforts to solve the intractable Arab-Israeli conflict. Arab countries have participated in past peace conference, but the League itself has not done so in a formal capacity.
In a sign of the skepticism, however, even among close U.S. allies, the Saudi foreign minister cautioned Friday that there would be no public handshakes with Israeli officials at the gathering.
The Arab ministers will meet in Washington the day before the talks to finalize their positions, Moussa said upon his departure.
Olmert and Abbas arrive before last attempt to formulate statement
Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas, Olmert, Livni and Defense Minister Ehud Barak all landed in Washington on Sunday. "The positions with the Israelis before Annapolis are still far apart, and the negotiations are still ongoing," Abbas said on the plane. Despite the differences, Abbas said he was committed to doing everything possible to hammer out a peace agreement in the coming year. Both Israel and the U.S. have said they hope to reach a deal before President George W. Bush leaves office in January 2009.
On Sunday, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice led a final round of talks aimed at drafting a joint Israeli-Palestinian declaration. Livni and Rice also met to discuss the contents of the session on a comprehensive regional peace.
Negotiations on the pre-summit declaration have deadlocked over whether the document should address the core issues of an agreement: final borders between Israel and a future Palestinian state, a resolution to disputed claims to Jerusalem; and the fate of Palestinians who became refugees following Israel's establishment in 1948.
The Palestinians want the document to address these core issues in general terms. Israel wants much vaguer language, though Olmert has promised to open negotiations on all areas of dispute after the Annapolis summit.
The foreign ministers of the Quartet of Middle East peacemakers -comprised of the U.S., European Union, United Nations and Russia - will also meet Sunday.
On Monday, the three Israeli ministers will meet with U.S. President George Bush, as will Abbas. Barak will also meet U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates to discuss the Iranian nuclear program. In the evening, Rice will host a dinner for all conference participants; both she and Bush will address the dinner.
The conference itself will take place on Tuesday. It will open at about 10 A.M. with a three-way meeting between Bush, Olmert and Abbas, after which each of the three will give a speech. Then, the working sessions will begin; representatives of other countries are expected to give speeches at various points during these sessions.
Livni will also try to meet privately with some of the Arab foreign ministers attending the conference, including those from countries with which Israel has no diplomatic relations.
On Wednesday, Olmert and Abbas will each meet privately with Bush to talk about the following steps to be taken. Olmert and Bush will also discuss the Iranian nuclear program. In internal discussions recently, Olmert has declared that "there will not be an Iranian bomb."
Over the weekend, Olmert spoke by phone with several leaders of countries sending representatives to Annapolis, including Russian President Vladimir Putin, King Abdullah of Jordan, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, French President Nicolas Sarkozy and Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
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