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Peace Process

Troubling turnaround at Olmert-Abbas meeting


By Stan Goodenough
May 05, 2008

After initial reports indicated a negative outcome, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and PLO chief terrorist Mahmoud Abbas reportedly held an unexpectedly successful meeting in Jerusalem Monday morning, with officials saying they had suddenly made "considerable progress."

Maps depicting the areas of Israel's historic lands being demanded by the Palestinian Arabs for their state were brought to the meeting, which was held at Olmert's official residence shortly after US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice ended a two-day visit to the land.

According to The Jerusalem Post, after "warmly" embracing Abbas, a man responsible for the deaths and wounding of untold numbers of Israeli Jews - Olmert told him Israel now realized the need to make "tangible" changes in Samaria and Judea because it was necessary that the months of peace talks be accompanied by actions on the ground.

Abbas' aides said earlier the PA chairman was contemplating resigning within a few months unless noticeable progress was made towards the creation of "Palestine."

Palestine is the name intended for the Arab state the international community is working to establish in the biblical heartland of the Jewish people.

Ha'aretz reported that a senior Israeli official had told Army Radio that during the meeting, Olmert and Abbas made "significant progress on the borders issue" - the issue of where the borders of the new "Palestine" would lie in relation to what would be left of Israel.

Abbas' authority is also being challenged by Hamas, which violently wrested control of Gaza from the PLO last year and is spreading its influence across Samaria and Judea.

Officials in the Prime Minister's Office said "these were the most serious talks the sides have ever conducted," according to Ynetnews.

Commentators wondered whether Olmert was trying to bolster Abbas in the face of the opposition against him, or whether the Israeli leader had perhaps been spurred to make sudden concessions because his own position is threatened in a new police investigation.

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