Clinton Denies Easing Pressure on Israel

By MARK LANDLER
Published: November 2, 2009

MARRAKESH, Morocco — Struggling to stem a chorus of protests from the Arab world, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton reiterated Monday that the Obama administration still wanted Israel to freeze construction of Jewish settlements, even if it regarded Israel’s compromise offer as “unprecedented.”

Arab leaders have expressed alarm that the United States seems to be decreasing pressure on Israel, after Mrs. Clinton said in Jerusalem on Saturday that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s proposal of restrained settlement construction was better than what any previous Israeli government had offered.

Mrs. Clinton said the administration would not stop pushing Mr. Netanyahu to do more. But she added that in trying to revive a stalled peace process, she wanted to offer Israel encouragement for moving in the right direction, even if that movement fell short of what the United States wanted.

“I will offer positive reinforcement to the parties when I believe they are taking steps that support the objective of reaching a two-state solution,” she said here, on the eve of a conference of Arab and Western countries. “I will also push them as I have in public and private to do even more.”

Though not a core subject in peace negotiations, Jewish settlements are a charged issue for both Israelis and Palestinians because they involve building in areas that both sides claim as their ancestral lands.

The administration’s position on settlements has become a hot-button subject in recent months. The Palestinians have refused to negotiate with Israel in the absence of a complete settlement freeze, and Arab nations have seized on what they view as a retreat by the United States.

Amr Moussa, the secretary general of the Arab League, urged the administration not to accept what he called a “slap in the face” by Israel. He said he hoped the Americans would “try hard and in a firmer way.”

“I’m really afraid that we’re about to see a failure,” Mr. Moussa said. “Failure is in the atmosphere all over.”

On Saturday, Mrs. Clinton met in the emirate of Abu Dhabi with the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, who rejected an Israeli proposal that would put a moratorium on construction of settlements in the West Bank, but allow the completion of about 3,000 housing units and exclude East Jerusalem from any restrictions.

The Palestinian foreign minister, Riyad al-Maliki, said that accepting such an offer would jeopardize the Palestinian Authority at a time when Mr. Abbas had already hurt his standing among Arabs by agreeing to defer the consideration of a United Nations report accusing both the Israelis and Palestinians of war crimes in Gaza last winter.

“We should not put the credibility and legitimacy of the Palestinian Authority again under jeopardy,” Mr. Maliki said in an interview. He said he was “surprised” by Mrs. Clinton’s comments in Jerusalem. “It was, from our point of view, inconsistent with what we had heard back in Abu Dhabi,” he said.

On Monday, Mrs. Clinton read a statement, in which she said, “The Obama administration position on settlements is clear, unequivocal, it has not changed. As the president has said on many occasions, the United States does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements.”

While the Obama administration may not have changed its policy, its public statements have evolved substantially. Last May, Mrs. Clinton said President Obama wanted to see “a stop to settlements — not some settlements, not outposts, not ‘natural growth’ exceptions.”

At the United Nations General Assembly in September, however, President Obama used the phrase “restrain” in referring to construction, suggesting the administration recognized they were unlikely to get a total freeze. Subsequent statements have used the word “curtail.”

In an interview, Mr. Maliki, the Palestinian foreign minister, said he believed the Israelis had trapped the administration and its special envoy for the Middle East, George J. Mitchell, by drawing them into a technical discussion of how many additional housing units would be acceptable.

“He said, ‘No, no, no, don’t worry. I know how to deal with this matter. I’m immune,’” Mr. Maliki said of Mr. Mitchell. “It seems, you know, that such immunity was not that effective,” he said.
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