Obama Says Israel, Palestinians Must Act With Urgency
At the start of his first joint meeting with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Obama said his special envoy, George Mitchell, will meet with Palestinian and Israeli negotiators next week. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will report on the status of those efforts next month, he said in New York.
By Kate Andersen Brower and Jonathan Ferziger
September 22nd, 2009
David Makovsky, a fellow at the Washington Institute of Near East Policy, said the three-way meeting is a “good first step.”
“You obviously cannot have negotiations unless you can get Netanyahu and Abbas in the same room. With the ice broken, hopefully the diplomatic thaw is now possible,” said Makovsky, co-author of a book on Middle East peacemaking with Obama’s senior adviser on the region, Dennis Ross.
