Wednesday, 24 December 2008
Outgoing Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert voiced firm determination for continuing direct talks between Israel and Syria during a lengthy meeting recently with his Turkish counterpart, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.
Israel and Syria held four rounds of indirect negotiations in Turkey after peace talks were launched in May. The talks were suspended after Olmert announced he would be stepping down from office. Olmert, who arrived in the Turkish capital on Monday evening for a farewell visit at Erdoğan's invitation, first met with President Abdullah Gül. Later he was hosted by Erdoğan at a dinner that was also attended by Foreign Minister Ali Babacan and lasted for five hours.
"Whatever we don't do today in the Middle East, we may not be able to achieve tomorrow. We must advance toward direct peace talks between Israel and Syria as soon as possible," Olmert was quoted as telling Erdoğan by the Israeli media.
"The path to peace passes through direct talks between the sides, and we must achieve such a process as soon as possible," Israeli daily Haaretz quoted the two leaders as saying.
The two countries previously held almost 10 years of US-supervised direct talks, which collapsed in 2000 over the scope of a proposed Israeli withdrawal from the occupied Golan Heights. Israel captured the plateau in the 1967 Middle East war and annexed it more than a decade later -- a move rejected by the United Nations. Turkey has been a key ally of the Jewish state since 1996, when the two countries signed a military cooperation deal. Turkey is one of the few Muslim countries that have friendly ties with Israel.
"A peace deal with Syria is achievable," Olmert said in a speech in Tel Aviv last week after the announcement of his visit to Ankara. He noted that the indirect talks through Turkey showed there was "a real chance for progress toward a peace deal and they pave the way for direct negotiations," without saying when direct talks might start.
Despite Olmert's apparent willingness to reach a peace deal with Syria, opposition hard-liner Benjamin Netanyahu has dismissed the peace efforts, saying any concessions the outgoing prime minister might make "do not and will not obligate a government that I shall head."
The situation in the Gaza Strip and Iran's controversial nuclear program were also on the agenda of Olmert's meeting with Erdoğan.
Earlier on Monday, Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh telephoned Erdoğan to ask that he urge Israel to lift its blockade on Gaza and to halt its military operations in the coastal strip. Taher al-Nono, a spokesman for Haniyeh, said Erdoğan had assured the Hamas leader he would raise these issues in his talks with Olmert in Ankara later in the day.
The ending of a truce between Israel and Hamas on Friday has raised fears that tensions along the Israeli-Gaza frontier could spark wider conflict, as Israeli and Palestinian officials stepped up their confrontational rhetoric.
During the meeting with Erdoğan, Olmert defended Israel's attacks on Gaza, saying that it was inevitable for Israel to respond harshly to attacks by Hamas. In response, Erdoğan described the situation in Gaza as "a humanitarian tragedy" and said the blockade of Gaza had been serving to escalate violence in the region.
Hamas accuses Israel of reneging on its agreements by conducting armed raids and shutting border crossings, disrupting a lifeline for food and fuel supplies to 1.5 million Palestinians in Gaza.
Israel blamed security threats for the closures, and many Israelis criticized the truce's failure to advance negotiations for the return of an Israeli soldier held in Gaza since 2006.
"The Annapolis process should be revived. In order to maintain reconciliation between Israel and Palestine, the conflict between the Hamas and Fatah factions should be resolved. An end should be given to the tragedy in Gaza," Erdoğan told Olmert in Ankara.
Israel and the Palestinians launched US-sponsored peace talks in Annapolis, Md., last year with the hope of reaching a deal by the end of 2008. The talks have been hobbled by violence and bitter disputes over Jewish settlement building and the future of Jerusalem, and all sides have said the year-end deadline will not be met.
In response to Olmert's expressed concern over Iran's controversial nuclear program, Erdoğan said Turkey wants the entire region to be free of nuclear weapons, while warning that a new war following the invasion of Iraq in 2003 would not be bearable for the region.
