Word: olmert
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...soul mate, Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni. Both are women with razor-sharp intellects, center-right convictions and an odd blend of rigid righteousness and pragmatism. Both work under men whose popularity has plummeted because of the bungled conduct of a war (Iraq for George Bush, Lebanon for Ehud Olmert). And both realize that this vulnerability, combined with the even greater weakness of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, has made the timing ripe for a new strategy for an Israeli-Palestinian peace...
...what a two-state solution would look like. If a suitable framework for a Palestinian state is reached, Abbas would then go to his people with a referendum: Do you want it or not? He is convinced that more than 70% would vote yes, thus marginalizing the Hamas resisters. Olmert would do the same, and probably get close to the same support...
Bush has come down on the side of pursuing a two-state framework now. To White House visitors he has provided his own savvy analysis of Olmert's precarious political situation and how both Olmert and Abbas need a breakthrough. Left unspoken is that Bush could use one as well. That is why he is sending Rice to make such an effort...
...Olmert is slightly uneasy about his Foreign Minister's new joint venture. Livni has made it known that she wants to follow in the footsteps of Israel's only other female Foreign Minister, Golda Meir, by becoming Prime Minister someday. Bush, on the other hand, has no such competitive worries about Rice. If she succeeds in creating a Middle East legacy other than the morass in Iraq, so does...
...plan to unilaterally redraw Israel's borders heedless of Palestinian wishes has proven a failure; rockets are still spewing out of Gaza. Because of Sharon, Israel is also less secure on its northern front. Already burned by an 18-year occupation of Lebanon, Sharon would probably have refrained from Olmert's blundering all-out attack last summer. But it was on Sharon's watch that Hizballah built up its defenses and smuggled missiles from Iran and Syria. Sharon might not recognize the country he left behind when he suffered his stroke a year ago, but many Israelis are coming around...