Word: settlements
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...Germany to meet Chancellor Angela Merkel on the last leg of his European jaunt. Though Merkel has always been careful to avoid pressuring Israel in public on the issue, German officials have said the Chancellor will remind Netanyahu during their meeting on Thursday of Berlin's position that all settlement activity in the West Bank be halted and that a final peace agreement be based on a two-state solution. (See pictures of life under Hamas in Gaza...
...that Jerusalem be the seat of the Palestinian state, calling the city "Israel's undivided capital." But having ignored most other demands forwarded by Palestinian authorities in their peace proposal, Netanyahu now finds himself under pressure from Western nations to give in to almost universal calls outside Israel that settlement on the West Bank be halted. (See pictures of Israel...
...face-saving manner of climbing down," says Yossi Mekelberg, an associate fellow at the British think tank Chatham House and program director of international relations at Regents College in London. "That climbdown requires that small, careful steps be taken at a consistent pace. Today we're talking about settlement freezes, which is nothing compared to questions like Jerusalem, border placement or the fate of refugees. But you have to start somewhere." (Read "The Six Issues That Divide Bibi from Barack...
...Were even imperfect movement made on the settlement issue, it would probably be enough to clear the way for Netanyahu to meet with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in the margins of next month's United Nations General Assembly. That resumption of direct contacts would be a major boost for Obama's stated foreign policy priority of laying the foundation of lasting peace in the Middle East. And it would also reverse the dramatically deteriorating Israeli-Palestinian relations that helped lift hard-line, mutually hostile governments to power on both sides of the divide. (See pictures of heartbreak in the Middle...
...Whether or not this happens, the landmark settlement may be a turning point for the Swiss banking sector, which can no longer depend on the promise of secrecy to draw in clients, says Stéphane Garelli, a professor of world competitiveness at the Institute of Management Development in Lausanne. "There is no doubt that this is the beginning for Swiss banks, because they now have to rely more on the professionalism and services than on some specificity of Swiss law, such as the banking secrecy," he says. "Now it is time to turn the page and to focus...