United States (US) Secretary of State Hillary Clinton arrived in the Middle East on Sunday, delving into Israeli-Palestinian peacemaking for the first time at an international donors conference for Gaza, which is to be held today (Monday).About 75 countries are taking part in the aid conference being held in the Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh. The US is expected to pledge more than $900 million at the conference. Washington also wants the money to bolster Western-backed Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and has stipulated no US funds will go through the militant group Hamas.
"I will be announcing a commitment to a significant aid package, but it will only be spent if we determine that our goals can be furthered rather than undermined or subverted," Clinton told Voice of America in an interview taped on Friday.
"All the pledges of aid this conference is expected to produce will be worth next to nothing if the donors do not demand that Israel open the borders to commercial goods as well as humanitarian essentials," said Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch.
Clinton will be joined by a host of top world officials including UN chief Ban Ki-moon, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and EU foreign policy envoy Javier Solana. "We expect rapid international aid from all parties to completely rebuild Gaza," Abbas told reporters on Saturday.
After the conference in Egypt, Clinton travels to Jerusalem to see Israeli politicians trying to cobble together a new government after February elections. Clinton plans to meet Benjamin Netanyahu, the hawkish Israeli prime minister-designate who on Saturday abandoned efforts to form a broad coalition government with centrist Tzipi Livni, who has been involved in US-brokered peace talks. "This is a sensitive time in Israeli politics as they seek to form a government, but I will take the opportunity to reaffirm the strength of the US-Israel relationship and talk about the best way to move peace forward," said Clinton.
Palestinian groups are taking part in Egyptian-mediated reconciliation talks. Clinton, who will travel to the West Bank, said the US could only accept Hamas in a unity government if it met three conditions: recognise Israel, sign on to previous Israeli-Palestinian agreements and renounce violence.
"Otherwise, I don't think it will result in the kind of positive step forward either for the Palestinian people or as a vehicle for a reinvigorated effort to obtain peace that leads to a Palestinian state," Clinton said. After meeting Abbas in his West Bank office and Prime Minister Salam Fayyad, Clinton will travel to Brussels to see NATO foreign ministers.