Barack Obama with Benjamin Netanyahu during a meeting in the Oval Office in Washington Picture: Saul Loeb/AFP/Getty Images Twitter 50 Facebook 15 Share 65 By Raf Sanchez, Washington6:55PM GMT 03 Mar 2014 US President warns Israeli leader that his country faces international isolation if he does not move to reach a peace agreement President Barack Obama has urged Benjamin Netanyahu to seize the fading chance for peace with the Palestinians and warned the US may not be able to shield Israel from the international fallout if no deal is reached. Breaking a months-long silence on the ongoing US-brokered peace talks, Mr Obama made clear he believes it is up to Israel to make the next move and break through The president borrowed an ancient Jewish proverb as he challenged Mr Netanyahu to take on the historic risks and opportunities of a deal: If not now, when? And if not you, Mr Prime Minister, then who? Speaking before the two leaders met at the White House, Mr Netanyahu insisted that it was the Palestinians, not him, that were preventing a deal from being reached. The tango in the Middle East needs at least three, he said as he landed in Washington. For years there have been two - Israel and the US. Now it needs to be seen if the Palestinians are also present. In an interview with Bloomberg, Mr Obama said he still believed that a peace agreement could be reached but that it gets harder by the day. The president said the growth of Israeli settlements in the West Bank and the surging Palestinian population living within Israel or under Israeli occupation would eventually undercut chances for an agreement. He also urged Mr Netanyahu to deal with Mahmoud Abbas, the relatively moderate 78-year-old Palestinian president, before old age forced him from office. We do not know what a successor to Abbas will look like, he said. Mr Obama said that while the USs commitment to Israel would remain rock-solid he may not be able to shield the Jewish state from the international fallout at the United Nations if it was seen as responsible for scuppering a deal. The US has traditionally using its power at the UN to protect Israel but Mr Obama hinted that position could become unsustainable in the face of global pressure. If Palestinians come to believe that the possibility of a contiguous sovereign Palestinian state is no longer within reach, then our ability to manage the international fallout is going to be limited, he said. The president also said he believed the hawkish Mr Netanyahu had the credibility and political strength to make a deal while still holding together his fractious coalition government, which includes far-right ministers. For him to seize this moment is perhaps the greatest gift he could give to future generations of Israelis, Mr Obama said. Mr Netanyahu has forcefully denounced the White Houses willingness to negotiate with Iran, calling the interim nuclear agreement signed in Geneva last year a historic mistake. Mr Obama defended the nuclear talks, insisting that Iran was not North Korea and would respond rationally to pressures and incentives from the six-nation negotiating bloc of the US, Britain, France, Russia, China and Germany. If you look at Iranian behaviour, they are strategic, and theyre not impulsive, Mr Obama said. They are a large, powerful country that sees itself as an important player on the world stage, and I do not think has a suicide wish, and can respond to incentives. An Israeli diplomatic source said Tel Aviv fears the White House harbours naive ambitions of improved relations with Iran well beyond the nuclear issue and hopes Tehran could be a stabilising force in both Afghanistan and Syria. Despite all the evidence to the contrary, some people seem to think Iran will be a responsible actor, they said.
Posted on: Tue, 04 Mar 2014 00:57:34 +0000
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