Clinton Asks Israeli Officials to Help Palestinians Build a 'Viable' State

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton expressed sympathy today for Israel’s need to respond to rocket attacks from the Gaza Strip, while urging Israeli officials to help the Palestinians better govern themselves.Israel should help its “responsible” Palestinian partners “strengthen their capacity to govern the Palestinian people and move toward a viable state,” Clinton told reporters in Egypt today after a money-raising conference for war-battered Gaza.Clinton said she is “troubled” by the continued rocket attacks from the coastal enclave, which is ruled by the Hamas rivals of the U.S.-backed Palestinian Authority government in the West Bank. Hamas, an Islamic political movement and militia, is a terrorist organization, according to the U.S. and Israel.The division among the Palestinians is one of the problems standing in the way of a peace effort that Clinton’s trip is meant to push forward. She travels next to Israel.Clinton sought to assure the conference that President Barack Obama will pursue a peace deal between Israel and its Arab neighbors with “vigor and intensity.” Citing the appointment of a special envoy for Middle East peace, George Mitchell, Clinton also pledged $900 million in aid for the Palestinians to underpin the government of Mahmoud Abbas.
By Viola Gienger
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