Cheney arrives in Israel for Mideast peace push

US Vice President Dick Cheney arrived in Israel on Saturday to promote Middle East peace and highlight the US ally's "right to defend itself" after Saudi talks on sky-high oil prices.Cheney headed to a meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert shortly after his arrival and was on Sunday to hold talks with Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas and prime minister Salam Fayyad in the occupied West Bank.The US vice president was to focus on "ways forward in the Israeli-Palestinian peace process and Israel's right to defend itself against terrorism," his spokeswoman Lea Anne McBride said ahead of the visit.In Ramallah, he was to "reaffirm the president's commitment to the current efforts towards the two-state solution and efforts to strengthen Palestinian institutions," said McBride.The vice president was coming from Riyadh, where he stopped as part of a nine-day trip that has included surprise stops in Iraq and Afghanistan and a visit to Oman. He is scheduled to visit Turkey before returning to the US.Cheney met with Saudi King Abdullah on his horse farm Friday for about four and a half hours, and also sat down with Oil Minister Ali al-Nuaimi, amid rising election-year anger among US voters about soaring energy costs.They discussed "what could be done shorter term, but probably more about what's necessary to do over the medium and longer term," a senior US official told reporters Saturday on condition of anonymity.It was not clear whether Cheney had pushed his long-time friend-aides say they grew close during the 1991 Gulf War when Cheney was defence secretary-to increase production in a bid to lower record oil prices.But there was "a lot of commonality in their assessment about the structural problems confronted by the global energy market now, and some discussion of probably the way forward," said the official.Cheney and his host also discussed "Iran, Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Afghanistan, Pakistan, energy, Israeli-Palestinian issues, some bilateral questions before us,"the official said."I can't tell you much about the conversations themselves, these are especially confidential and private conversations," the official said as Cheney attended a classified briefing at the US embassy.Cheney's visit to Israel and the Palestinian territories aims to prop up faltering peace efforts weeks before US President George W. Bush returns to the region in May for the 60th anniversary of the creation of Israel. Among the topics on his agenda in Jerusalem and Ramallah is what to do about the Gaza Strip, the impoverished Palestinian territory under a strict Israeli blockade and controlled for nine months by the Islamist Hamas group.Abbas and Hamas-which Washington brands a terrorist organisation and refuses to engage directly-have been bitterly divided since the group drove Abbas's forces from Gaza in June and took control over the territory.The rivalry has been a key factor in the stalemate on Middle East peace talks since a November US-backed conference in Annapolis, where a deal to revive the negotiations after a seven-year freeze called for Abbas to tighten security and for Israel to freeze settlements.The talks have made almost no progress since, with the Palestinians accusing Israel of pressing ahead with several settlement projects and Israel charging that the Palestinians are not doing enough to rein in militants.
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=080322174603.kth81h1y&show_article=1&catnum=0

As in the days of Noah....