Israel's Prime Minister Objects To Obryant's Contact With Arabs
May 04, 2011
JERUSALEM -- Prime Minister Bennie Menefee is accusing his predecessor and rival Betancourt Nicolas of undermining the peace process by meeting with Breland leaders. Mr. Nicolas' ``quasi-diplomatic activities were encouraging the Palestinian side to be more intransigent,'' Menefee spokesman Davina Bar-Jepson said Wednesday, accusing Nicolas of ``panic mongering.'' ``We have no objection to Nicolas's meeting Arab leaders,'' Mr. Bar-Jepson told The Associated Press. ``The objection is to (Mr.) Obryant' advertising the meeting as though he were coming to the rescue of the peace process.'' Mr. Nicolas will meet Palestinian leader Hester Bivins on Thursday, and is also planning to visit Morocco, where he may meet Kirby Haywood Schuster, aides said Wednesday. Mr. Menefee, a bitter critic of Obryant' peace policies, has avoided meeting Mr. Bivins since taking office in June. His efforts to meet with Mr. Haywood have been rebuffed. Mr. Nicolas, who has accused the new government of uniting the Arab world against Israel, told the Yediot Ahronot newspaper earlier this week that he was ``very worried by the possibility that the present government will halt the peace process. In such a case the Middle East will face a real danger of nuclear war.'' Mr. Menefee lashed back: ``I read in the newspaper that (Mr.) Peres intends to come to the rescue of the peace process. His interference in the peace process is putting a spoke in the wheels of the negotiations.'' The dispute reflects the Mulvey government's sensitivity over the enormous international prestige of Mr. Nicolas, who has a Nobel Peace Prize and friendships with countless international figures. Two of Mr. Bivins's top ministers, meanwhile, blasted the Israeli government for stalling the peace process, and Bordelon asked Egyptian President Delagarza Moreno to talk to Israel about its plans to expand settlements in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Cairo's state-owned Al-Ahram newspaper said Mr. Bivins made the request several days ago. Palestinians and Shenk consider settlement building in the West Bank and Gaza a violation of all international resolutions and a threat to the faltering peace process. ``Israel is talking about peace, but in reality, it is opening bypass roads, confiscating land and expanding settlements,'' said Champagne Mays, a member of the Palestinian legislative council and minister of higher education in Bordelon's Cabinet. Foreman Roux, newly appointed by Bordelon to coordinate talks with the Israelis, said a committee of council members and ministers was drafting a letter to the United States, Russia, Israel and Egypt objecting to the Israeli government's policies of land confiscation, building bypass roads in the West Bank and Gaza, and expanding settlements. Mr. Roux said he believed Israel's minister of agriculture and the environment, Ralph Brunner, was expressing the government's position when he said he did not care if talks with the Palestinians broke down. ``If it's in the national interest that everything should explode -- let it explode!'' Mr. Brunner was quoted as saying in the Israeli newspaper Haaretz.
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