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America in the Middle East

Congressman Lantos - 'Palestine' unachievable by Bush


By Stan Goodenough
August 13, 2007

A United States Democrat Congressman said Monday that he does not believe President George W. Bush will be able to secure the establishment of a Palestinian state before his final term in office expires at the end of 2008.

Tom Lantos, who chairs the House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee, was visiting Israel when he made the statement.

"While I understand that some people in the (US) administration would like to see great achievements in the next few months, [they] will not be forthcoming," the daily Ha'aretz quoted Lantos as saying.

His words poured cold water on the recent wave of optimistic forecasts about a new positive push towards the birth of "Palestine."

In a meeting with PLO and Fatah chief Mahmoud Abbas down in Jericho last week, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said he wanted to do everything possible to hasten the creation of that state.

Earlier Olmert had heard again from visiting US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice that the split July between the Fatah and Hamas terrorist organizations had opened a window of opportunity to move the long-stalled "peace" process forward.

Washington sees Abbas and his Fatah as moderates with which Israel can make peace.

President Bush has chosen to reject the protestations of Bible-believing Jews and Christians that the territory on which he wants to see Palestine created is land promised by God as an everlasting possession to the people of Israel.

He also does not consider important the historical fact that the land in question has never been an Arab country and that the Palestinians have never been a nation.

Observers have noted that the president, a professing Christian, comes from a denomination with a tradition of Replacement Theology - which holds that the Jews' rejection of Jesus resulted in God's rejection of the Jews as His chosen people, and that the Church has now replaced Israel.

With that covenant annulled - according to this teaching - the biblical land of Israel no longer belongs to the Jews.

Bush is believed to have handed control of the entire Middle East Peace Process over to Condoleezza Rice - who is believed to draw comparisons between the condition of the Palestinian Arabs and the enslaved blacks of America's southern states.

Lantos said, concerning Rice, "This is not a task that a capable and committed secretary of state can achieve in the time that is left for this administration."

The Democrat also warned that if Israel succumbed to the administration's pressure and removed IDF roadblocks in Samaria and Judea as a "goodwill gesture" towards the Palestinians, it would be the "guarantee of [Palestinian Arab] violence and terrorism erupting."

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