Robust Rice at the GA

...I believe that most Palestinians and most Arab states are ready to end the conflict. I believe that most Israelis are ready to leave most of the -- nearly all of the West Bank, just as they were ready to leave Gaza, for the sake of peace [that's an untruth]. I believe that we have two democratic leaders in Prime Minister Olmert and President Abbas, who know that the best way to serve their people is to build a basis for peace. And I believe that the international community is now more constructively engaged than before, which we see in Prime Minister Tony Blair's support as Quartet Special Envoy as Palestinians strive to build the capable institutions of a responsible state.

Now the opportunity before us does not obviate the need for hard, even unprecedented choices by all parties involved. Israelis and Palestinians alike need to recognize that peace will require difficult, painful sacrifices to some of their longest-held aspirations. The same is true of responsible Arab states. If our Arab friends of long standing truly desire peace, then they need to demonstrate to their people and to the world that they believe that Israel has a permanent home in the Middle East. (Applause.)

The time has come to seize that opportunity and that is why we intend to hold a
serious and substantive meeting in Annapolis. Our current course is not meant to replace the roadmap, nor to supplant direct negotiations between the parties, but to take this new opportunity and to pursue peace and to protect ourselves against those with far darker designs. We can succeed and we must succeed. Failure is simply not an option. In Hamas' coup in Gaza, in Hezbollah's war in Lebanon and in the rise of an aggressive Iranian regime, we see that violent extremism is evolving in new and dangerous ways. Ways that make it a threat not only to the people of one nation or one race or one religion, but to everyone in the Middle East who seeks peace and a life of modernity with dignity...

...The Palestinians made a realistic prospect of statehood to arrest their slide into
despair, for as we read in Proverbs: Where this is no vision, the people perish. [so, why do the Pals. continue to be around? They do have a vision. And it's an evil one but a vision neverhteles - YM]. And that, ladies and gentlemen, is my fear that if Palestinian reformists cannot deliver on their people's hope of an independent state, then the moderate center could collapse and the next generation of Palestinians could become lost souls of unbridled extremism. Yes this is a trying time -- there's no doubt about it. It's not a time for half measures. It is a time for responsible leaders, Israelis and Palestinians, Americans and Arabs to make the difficult decisions that peace requires to make them courageously and to make them confidently.

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