Excerpt
JUDY WOODRUFF (Newshour): They shook hands and played down disagreements, but there were clear tensions at today's Obama-Netanyahu meeting. The head-to-head at the White House followed the president's Middle East speech a day earlier.
President Obama and Prime Minister Netanyahu shared a few brief smiles for reporters after a lengthy session behind closed doors in the Oval Office.
PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA: And I reiterated and we discussed in depth the principles that I laid out yesterday, the belief that our ultimate goal has to be a secure Israeli state, a Jewish state living side-by-side in peace and security with a contiguous, functioning and effective Palestinian state.
JUDY WOODRUFF: The president had raised Israeli hackles on Thursday, when he directly endorsed a key Palestinian demand, for peace negotiations to be based on a return to 1967 borders. That's before Israel occupied the West Bank, Gaza, and East Jerusalem in the Six Day War.
He also called for land swaps with the Palestinians to compensate for disputed areas. The president didn't mention the 1967 borders today, but Netanyahu did. And, as yesterday, he rejected the idea.
Translation; the Palestine vs Israel issue will continue to plague the world until
The End of Days.
PBS Newshour 5/20/2011
Ah.... the voice of Dreamers. One can only hope.
PBS Newshour 5/24/2011
No comments:
Post a Comment