CAIRO: US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will meet with Arab counterparts in Sharm El-Sheikh at the end of July, the Foreign Ministry announced Tuesday. The visit is to immediately follow a meeting of Arab ministers in Cairo on July 29 according to the statement. Quoting Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit, the statement said the purpose of the meeting is to "hold discussions on the regional situation, the Palestinian issue, the American President s statement yesterday ... and the Arab peace initiative. On Monday, President George W. Bush called for an international Middle East peace conference to be held later this year, which would include Israel, Palestine and some of their Arab neighbors. Bush said in a speech, which was intended to signal a change in his administration's attitude towards the peace process, that "this is a moment of clarity for all Palestinians. And now comes a moment of choice. Clearly indicating who will be representing the Palestinians at the conference, Bush said that President Mahmoud Abbas and his Prime Minister Salam Fayyad "are striving to build the institutions of a modern democracy, while Hamas "has demonstrated beyond all doubt that it is devoted to extremism and murder. The choice Bush spoke of earlier was whether Palestinians would support Fatah and its leader Abbas in the West Bank, or throw their support behind Hamas in the Gaza Strip. Bush also pledged more support for Abbas and his government; and in phone calls to Saudi King Abdullah, President Hosni Mubarak and Jordanian King Abdullah II, he urged the Arab nations to support Abbas' endeavors. The conference appears to mainly be a show of support for Abbas more than an attempt to solve the conflict, Diaa Rashwan from Al Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies told The Daily Star Egypt. "It is to give him [Abbas] a form of legitimacy. The conference will not work because the balance is not right, Rashwan continued, "Israel faces no internal or external pressure to make any concessions; while the Palestinians are divided. Rashwan did agree that "it is a change in US policy, which usually does not promote conferences. The US usually refuses general conferences on the Middle East. However, "Bush is still talking in one direction; the US still prefers parallel negotiations but have changed the form, he added, pointing out that the US does not believe that addressing the Palestinian, Lebanese and Syrian issues together is the right approach. Rather, the US views them as separate issues which cannot be solved together. Prior to Bush's call for a peace conference, Abbas had met with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in Jerusalem on Monday, a step that highlighted their partnership against Hamas. After the meeting, Israel announced it would free 250 Palestinian prisoners on Friday; most of them from Abbas' group Fatah. None were from Hamas. Olmert did ask Abbas to take decisive action on disarming cells in the West Bank, and to enforce a Presidential decree to allow only security personnel to bear arms. In an effort to further strengthen Abbas' hand against Hamas, Israel has unfrozen over $100 million of the tax and customs duties it collects on behalf of the Palestinians and had refused to hand over until now.
