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Amr Mousa: U.S. Must Become Honest Broker of Peace
Tuesday, February 5, 2002
Islam Online
With additional reporting by Ayesha Ahmad, IOL Correspondent

“To call on Arafat to stop the attacks…that is fine. But you should call on [Israeli Prime Minister Ariel] Sharon to stop the atrocities being committed in the Occupied Territories. Arafat can only do more if the Israelis do more,” Mousa asserted.

WASHINGTON
Arab League Secretary-General Amr Mousa on Tuesday urged the U.S. to take stronger steps towards becoming an honest broker of peace in what he called a “deadlock” in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, and discussed the pivotal role of Arab Americans in building strong relations between the U.S. and the Arab world.

“We are facing a situation where one party [Israel] feels like it has all the support and immunity and the other party [the Palestinians] feels oppressed, weak and occupied. An equation is not there - the conditions for a deal are not there.

“The weaker party will never be able to achieve the desired result so long as it remains occupied,” Mousa said.

Speaking at the National Press Club in Washington D.C., Mousa stated that the Arab League, and Arab countries as a whole, qualifies the continued atrocities committed by Israel in the Occupied Territories and the breakdown of negotiations as a “worst case scenario.”

“We in the Middle East face a very serious situation where the peace process seems to many to be a thing of the past. The situation in the Occupied Territories, the actual interaction around the conditions of peace between Israel… and Palestine has deteriorated, and we are now going [into] a worst-case scenario.”

“The situation in the Occupied Territories exceeds what is shown [in the media]… Palestinians are under attack and suffering from a policy of destruction, of targeted killings, of closures and of so many others…”
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2002 © Islam Online.

Dan