In Search for Peace, a Shrinking White House Role
Media Mention of Ghaith al-Omari In The Washington Post - March 3, 2008 - 1:00am

Ghaith al-Omari, a former adviser to Abbas and now advocacy director for the American Task Force on Palestine, faulted the Bush administration for not nurturing a process that it started. He noted that the administration has appointed three generals to assess various aspects of the issue, but that few people in the region understand their roles. Rice's two-day visit this week is her first substantive trip since the conference in November.

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Kosovo And Palestine: Why Different Standards?
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Arab News
by Walid Awad - (Opinion) February 29, 2008 - 6:09pm

In July 2000, President Clinton, at the insistence of Israel’s Prime Minister Ehud Barak, invited President Arafat and Barak to Camp David. In less than two weeks of intensive negotiations, Clinton expected Arafat and Barak to arrive at a solution to end the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. Incomplete progress was achieved at Camp David, but an agreement was not.

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Putting The Strategy To The Test
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz
(Editorial) February 29, 2008 - 6:09pm

Dozens of rockets are fired every day at southern communities, people are being killed and wounded and struggling to retain their sanity in the face of a threat that disrupts their daily routines, and all the while, Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni is meeting with Ahmed Qureia (Abu Ala) in an effort to reach a peace agreement. This is the Olmert government's diplomatic strategy. But in order to learn whether it stands a chance, it needs to finally be put to the test.

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Far From Glow Of Annapolis, Rice Heads To Mideast
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Reuters
by Sue Pleming - February 29, 2008 - 6:02pm

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice travels to Israel and the Palestinian territories next week, with U.S. credibility at stake and peace talks stymied by escalating violence in Hamas-run Gaza. Three months ago, Israelis and Palestinians pledged at a peace conference in Annapolis, Maryland, that they would seek a deal by the end of the Bush administration in January 2009.

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The Israeli Intransigence
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Dar Al Hayat
by Randa Takieddine - (Opinion) February 28, 2008 - 4:48pm

Every time the Israeli army or its leadership loses a certain battle, it treats its investigation into the causes behind this fiasco as some form of repentance. Many reports and investigations followed the war on Lebanon in 2006 as well as the horrible massacres in Qana and before that Sabra and Shatilla. But nothing really changed in the perspective of an Israeli leadership that fails to see that its policies will backfire and haunt its fate in the future.

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Hope Still Alive
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jordan Times
(Editorial) February 28, 2008 - 4:46pm

Today His Majesty King Abdullah starts a working visit to the US, with a schedule of talks and meetings intended to enhance bilateral relations and tackle a host of other issues. It is not strange that the Palestinian question will be one of the top issues to be discussed during His Majesty’s talks with US President George W. Bush and other key US administration officials, as well as UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon.

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Israel Must Learn From Mistakes Of Others
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Gulf News
by George S. Hishmeh - (Opinion) February 28, 2008 - 4:45pm

Why doesn't Israel learn from the mistakes of other nations, including its arch-supporter, the United States, in conducting its policies, which have been directly responsible for the state of malaise in the Middle East. For a start, all Israel has to do is to closely examine US foreign policy especially the blunders committed during the administration of George W. Bush.

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Whose Jerusalem Is It, Anyway?
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Slate
by Shmuel Rosner - (Opinion) February 28, 2008 - 4:41pm

"Arafat balked at not having sovereignty over all of East Jerusalem, including the Temple Mount." That's former President Bill Clinton's version of the defining moment of the failed Camp David summit of 2000. "He turned the offer down." Clinton "called Arab leaders for support," but "most wouldn't say much." Not one of them was brave enough—or stupid enough—to take the credit and the blame for helping Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat give up, even if only symbolically, on Muslim control of the Temple Mount.

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Still Building
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Baltimore Sun
by Hagit Ofran - (Opinion) February 28, 2008 - 4:39pm

Every few days, Israel's prime minister repeats his commitment to freeze West Bank settlements and remove illegal outposts. Such commitments and statements from successive Israeli governments have been a part of our lives since the 1993 Oslo agreement.

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Drifting Further From The Path Of Common Sense, Realism And Peace
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Jordan Times
by Hasan Abu Nimah - (Opinion) February 27, 2008 - 6:50pm

Israel seems to be concerned by the slow pace of the peace negotiations jump-started by the US-sponsored meeting in Annapolis last November. Months have passed since that “historic” gathering was concluded, and yet there is no sign of any movement. Ramallah-based Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert continue to meet regularly, but only “like two old men at the doctor’s office who meet up to chat before returning home to their afternoon nap”, as a Haaretz columnist recently put it.

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