Kurtzer: I did not cast doubt on Bush-Sharon accord
By Jerusalem Post staff and AP, THE JERUSALEM POST Mar. 24, 2005
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US Ambassador to Israel Dan Kurtzer told Israel Radio's Shmuel Tal Friday
that the report of his statements about the status of the settlements in the
West Bank after disengagement in Yediot Ahronotwas "filled with errors." He
emphasized that he had not cast doubt on the understanding reached between
Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and US President George W. Bush. He said rather
that he was addressing the general policy of the United States towards the
future of the large settlement blocs.
Kurtzer talked with senior officials in the Prime Minister's Office on
Friday and clarified the statements that were quoted in his name in Yediot
Ahronot.

A press release from the US Embassy distributed on Friday explicitly
responded to the report, "The Yediot Aharonot article on Ambassador
Kurtzer's meeting with Foreign Ministry cadets on February 24th is so full
of errors and misrepresentations that ordinarily the Ambassador would not
comment.

However, given the media coverage this story has received, the Ambassador
wants to clarify what was said and what was not said to the junior officers'
training course.

The paper's claim that the Ambassador called into question the
understandings reached between President Bush and Prime Minister Sharon last
April 14th is false. The Ambassador said that all the major understandings,
including those relating to settlement blocs, were incorporated in a letter
from President Bush to Prime Minister Sharon on April 14, 2004. Any future
final status resolution must reflect the new realities on the ground,
especially the existing major Israeli population centers. Therefore, as the
President stated in his letter, it is unrealistic to expect that the outcome
of negotiations will be a full and complete return to the 1967 lines. This
remains the policy of the US Government.

The paper's claim that the Ambassador predicted the collapse of the
Government of Israel following disengagement is false.
Earlier it was reported that Kurtzer had refuted reports from political
sources in Jerusalem that there was an understanding with the United States
about leaving blocs of settlements intact in the West Bank.

"In [Prime Minister] Ariel Sharon's office, they don't understand what we
are saying," Kurtzer reportedly said during the meeting with Foreign
Ministry cadets in Jerusalem, Army Radio reported. He also stressed that
after the implementation of the disengagement plan, the US would demand from
both Israel and the Palestinians to then return to implementing the road
map.
In a dig at Israeli diplomats, Kurtzer reportedly said, "They have a
tendency to return again and again to the same topics, and at the beginning
of every meeting they repeat the mantra - Jerusalem is the eternal capital
of Israel."

It was also reported Friday that Kurtzer has estimated that Sharon's
government would not survive until the end of its term and would fall after
disengagement.

Yediot Ahronot responded to accusations of wild inaccuracies in their
reporting saying that there was an official, professional Foreign Ministry
stenographer recording the Kurtzer-cadets meeting and that their quotes
exactly match the official protocol, Israel Radio reported.

Kurtzer is scheduled to speak with Sharon via telephone to personally
clarify his remarks and assure the prime minister of the US's continued
support.

In response to Kurtzer's statements prior to his clarification, Knesset
Member Arye Eldad (National Union) said on Friday, "The prime minister's
great fraud has been uncovered. Israel is not getting a thing in exchange
for the transfer, and this is the time to appoint an investigative committee
to determine the true motives of the disengagement plan."

MK Zehava Gal-on (Yahad) said that it is good that the US is dispelling the
cloud cover, "The cessation of the total occupation is the only solution to
the conflict which will garner international support."

MK Eliezer Sandberg (Shinui) said Friday that Kurtzer's response shatters
Sharon and Dov Weisglass's illusion, "The time has
come that the prime minister reveal his real intentions regarding Jerusalem,
the West Bank, and the Golan."

On Thursday, Washington sources said that the Bush Administration did not
plan to publicly confront the Israeli government over newly approved plans
to build 3,500 new homes to the west of Ma'aleh Adumim.

According to the sources, quoted on Israel Radio, the administration, while
opposed in principle to all expansion of settlements and to the new building
at Ma'aleh Adumim in particular, does not want to spark a row on the issue
with Sharon so as not to further complicate his efforts to push the budget
through the Knesset this week and thus cement the legislative process ahead
of the summer's US-backed disengagement from the Gaza Strip and northern
West Bank.

Meanwhile, senior Palestinian officials asked two US envoys on Thursday to
help block the expansion of Ma'aleh Adumim, saying it endangers peace
prospects, undermines their efforts to show that moderation brings results
and isolates east Jerusalem - their intended capital.

Palestinian Authority negotiator Saeb Erekat said the envoys expressed
opposition to the Israeli plan to build in an area known as E1 between
Ma'aleh Adumim and Jerusalem, which Erekat said would fill in the last piece
of empty land.

Erekat told the envoys, National Security Council official Elliott Abrams
and David Welch, assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern affairs, that
US opposition was not enough. "You have to pressure Sharon to halt all
settlement activities... if you want the peace process to have credibility,"
he reported telling them.

There are 32,000 residents of Ma'aleh Adumim. The plan to expand the
settlement has been around for about a decade, but was approved earlier this
week by Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz.

The envoys questioned Sharon about the plan on Wednesday. US officials have
repeatedly criticized plans to enlarge Ma'aleh Adumim over the years, and
the US-backed "road map" peace plan, presented in 2003 by US President
George W. Bush, bans all construction in settlements.

PA Prime Minister Ahmed Qurei told Abrams and Welch he expected Washington
to take a clear position against Israeli settlement expansion plans.

While championing disengagement, Sharon has repeated Israel's claim to all
of Jerusalem and hopes to reinforce main settlements in the West Bank,
including Ma'aleh Adumim.