US Puts Pressure on Israel to Refrain from Attacks

[sabra]

Source: TIME

U.S. officials have asked Israel to refrain from launching any major military action in the region during the waning days of the Bush presidency, Israeli sources have told TIME. Previously, some Israeli military officials had hinted to the media that if Israel were to carry out its threats to strike at Iranian nuclear installations, it might do so before Barack Obama enters the White House in January. But now, a Defense Ministry official says, "We have been warned off."

The call for restraint was relayed to Israeli officials by senior U.S. counterparts, TIME's sources say, and it is likely to be reinforced during Monday's valedictory meeting in Washington between Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and President George W. Bush.

Washington's concerns are not limited to the possibility of Israel attacking Iran, the sources say; U.S. officials have also cautioned Israelis against launching a ground assault inside the besieged Palestinian territory of Gaza in a bid to stop militants there from firing rockets into southern Israel. Bush Administration officials warn that such an attack could cost many lives and jeopardize the painstaking, but futile, efforts of U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to broker a peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinian Authority. See pictures of tensions along the Gaza border

To strengthen the case against Israel invading Gaza, U.S. officials turned to Jordan's King Abdullah for help in stemming the rocket attacks from Gaza, according to knowledgeable Palestinian and Jordanian officials. Because the U.S. has avoided direct talks with the militant Hamas movement, which runs Gaza but which the U.S. deems a terrorist organization, Abdullah was approached to act as a go-between, these sources told TIME. The Jordanian monarch complied with the U.S. request, and last week he dispatched a senior intelligence officer to Damascus to warn exiled Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal that Gaza was in danger of an Israeli attack unless the rocket-fire was immediately stopped.

Read more: http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1861524,00.html

[Wizard777]

1. Out of all of the things in this world that we try to preserve. Peace is the most important of them.

Without peace all our other preservation efforts are for naught.

[aquart]

2. Here I thought George and Israel had agreed to attack Iran.

At least, that's what I've been reading on DU.

[The Stranger]

3. So the incoming Administration has taken steps to prevent that.

At least, that's what the original post seems to indicate.

[daleo]

4. Remember what Poppy did to Clinton (Somalia)

The operation, code-named RESTORE HOPE, began on 8 December 1992 under the direction of a Unified Task Force, or UNITAF.
...
Marine Corps and Navy special operations elements moved into Somalia in the early morning hours of 9 December, with the first 1,300 marines coming in by helicopter directly to Mogadishu airport.

http://www.history.army.mil/brochures/Somalia/Somalia.htm
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I will trust Bush not to pull any more stunts only after he is well out of the White House.