[Dr. Aaron Lerner - IMRA: Secretary Rice says that the " breakthrough" is
not requiring Palestinian compliance before final status talks but assures
us that compliance will be required before the creation of a sovereign
Palestinian state.

Don't count on it.

When the time comes for a photo-op creation of a sovereign Palestinian state
but the Palestinians haven't complied she can either look into the cameras
and say how pleased she is to have received a report that the PA has
fulfilled its Road Map obligations or proclaim once again what a swell guy
Mahmoud Abbas is and explain that he will only really have the power to
comply when he actually has a sovereign state.]

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice Roundtable with Traveling Press
Secretary Condoleezza Rice
Jerusalem, Israel
November 4, 2007
www.state.gov/secretary/rm/2007/11/94600.htm

...QUESTION:Yeah, (inaudible) this morning that the Israeli Prime
Minister -- didn't seem very conciliatory. What's going on? Is --

SECRETARY RICE: People are negotiating. (Laughter.) People are negotiating.

QUESTION:To go back to -- right to the beginning, because it's back against
the first -- exactly the same language as when you announced there was a
conference or a meeting.

SECRETARY RICE: I think -- I think, Sylvie, that she put it best. They are
negotiating. The atmosphere is good. Of course when you negotiate, you run
into differences. That's why you negotiate. And they're working their way
through those differences, but I think that what is really being -- is --
you're starting to see here is that people are starting to see Annapolis as
the beginning of a process, not a single point in time.
And that's extremely important because the more that they talk about the day
after Annapolis and that they are going to have to continue their work to
the establishment of a Palestinian state, the more likely they are to get to
a place where they're actually going to end the conflict. And I think what
you're seeing is that people are starting to address really difficult issues
that they haven't addressed in a long time. And that means that, you know,
they're negotiating and they're trying not to negotiate in the newspapers.
They really are, which is remarkable.

QUESTION:Madame Secretary --

SECRETARY RICE: I know that disappoints all of you, but they really are
trying not to negotiate in the newspapers.

QUESTION:On that same point, I mean, in Olmert and Abbas, I mean, you have
two figures who are clearly (inaudible), but politically weak. And indeed,
there have been reports in local media that -- you know, even some
understandings that Olmert made, for example, were walked back by Livni, on
the other hand, some of the commitments that Abbas made were walked back to
some degree by his foreign minister.
Can this really -- I mean, can they really come to an agreement by
themselves without a stronger U.S. hand?

SECRETARY RICE: They're not supposed -- look, they're not coming to an
agreement about the establishment of a Palestinian state. Let's not --

QUESTION:Even though (inaudible)?

SECRETARY RICE: Let's not misunderstand what it is they're trying to do.
They are trying to establish that they have a basis for moving forward to
negotiate the agreement on a Palestinian state. They're not going to, in the
two weeks -- they wouldn't -- in the six weeks before they started it,
nobody would have expected that this was going to be an agreement on the
Palestinian state. And the more that they look forward, I think, to how
they're actually going to get to an agreement, which is what you -- we
really want them to do; after all, any joint document will not ultimately be
worth the paper it's written on if eventually, they don't get to an actual
agreement on a Palestinian state.

So what we've really been trying to be very clear on is that they want to
come to Annapolis with some understandings about how they move forward. But
increasingly, you hear them talking not so much about specifically what
might be in this document, but about how they are going to actually get to
the negotiation of a Palestinian state. And I think that's actually a very
healthy move.

QUESTION:And that begins at Annapolis? I was wondering where this --

SECRETARY RICE: Well, again, I'm also not going to negotiate in the
newspapers, but there is more talk about the day after now than I have heard
in any of my other trips here.

QUESTION:And just one more. At that point, then, does the U.S. then play a
stronger role in terms of the move beyond bilateral to --

SECRETARY RICE: Let me just go back for a second. Were we in this very room
in February?

QUESTION:Yes.

(Laughter.)

SECRETARY RICE: Okay.

QUESTION:Several times.

SECRETARY RICE: Okay? When everybody said, is "political horizon" an empty
phrase for "They can't talk about the real issues," everybody remember
that?

QUESTION:This is off the record.

SECRETARY RICE: Yeah. (Laughter.)

QUESTION:We're not at liberty to talk --

SECRETARY RICE: They -- they --

(Laughter.)

QUESTION:We don't negotiate.

SECRETARY RICE: Yeah. They haven't gotten to where they are now because of
the absence of a U.S. role in helping them get there. And what I am doing
and what the President has done a couple of times in phone calls and what
Steve Hadley was doing when he was out here is that we're helping them
vector toward one another in what I think will be a very fruitful outcome,
that I think they're going to be able to lay -- let everyone know that they
are -- that they are laying a foundation and that they want to move to,
actually, the establishment of a Palestinian state. And a lot of that is
bilateral discussion, negotiation, understandings. A lot of it is that, you
know, when we see problems, we try to help them bridge them.

But you know, I know that there's an image that I think is probably -- by
the way, if you actually look at the history, probably not exactly how it
happened. But there is an image of the United States just frenetically
trying to get the two sides to an agreement. Okay; it hadn't worked. So with
all due respect, I'll try it my way because it hasn't worked. In the final
analysis, something has always prevented the Israelis and the Palestinians
from getting there.

And I think that what they're doing now -- and the work we're doing with the
Arabs, by the way, because one of the missing ingredients has always been
the Arabs in on the ground floor rather than being asked late in the process
to (inaudible). I think that we really are trying to lay the groundwork so
that you have a reasonable prospect this time that they'll actually conclude
an agreement.

QUESTION:Madame Secretary, I think this morning, it didn't sound like
Foreign Minister Livni was talking about understanding. She was talking
about potential steps on the ground to control the violence before the
Annapolis conference even happens.

SECRETARY RICE: No, no, I think what -- I don't want to put words in her
mouth, but when she talks about the implementation of the roadmap as being
essential to the implementation of an agreement, that's our position too.
You can't imagine the circumstances in which you're actually implementing an
agreement for a Palestinian state and you haven't fulfilled the obligations
of the roadmap which speak to both sides.

QUESTION:So that comes after?

SECRETARY RICE: It --

QUESTION:What you're saying is that you're comfortable that they will show
up in Annapolis even with some rockets flying into (inaudible)?

SECRETARY RICE: Well, I don't want to -- I'm not going to speak for them,
but I don't think that they -- anybody believes that the kasams coming out
of Gaza are the work of Abu Mazen and his team. And in fact, what you've got
here is the Palestinians trying to establish themselves as a leadership --
an administration that can carry out certain security tasks, which is why
what is going on with General Dayton and -- you know, the Palestinians
starting to take over some security responsibilities is very important. It's
why, by the way, the work Tony Blair is doing also in terms of state
capacity is very important.

But I think everybody understands who is responsible for the violence now
and it's coming out of Gaza and it's not controlled by the Palestinian
Authority. That's not what the Israelis were -- are talking about. They're
talking about and we are talking about that even if we're fortunate enough
to get an agreement, you're still going to have to fulfill the first phase
of the roadmap because you can't imagine a two-state solution working
without those pieces in place, both on the Israeli side and on the
Palestinian side.

QUESTION:Madame Secretary --

SECRETARY RICE: All right, you haven't had a question yet.

QUESTION:Why did you decide now to grant invitations this time? Is the day
slipping?

SECRETARY RICE: No, the date is not slipping. It hasn't been set yet, but
it's not slipping and -- (laughter) -- and it's just -- it's not quite right
yet for invitations, but we'll -- people will -- I don't -- I have a feeling
that when we do deliver invitations, we won't find many people who just say,
"Well, I'm sorry, I'm busy."

QUESTION:Can I just --

SECRETARY RICE: Yeah, I think we can -- I think we'll be okay on that front.

QUESTION:Can I just follow up?

SECRETARY RICE: Sure.

QUESTION:I heard from somebody who works for the PLO in Washington that the
Egyptians are pressuring the Palestinians not to go.

SECRETARY RICE: Wholly untrue.

QUESTION:You mentioned a phase one of the roadmap. Phase one also
mentions -- stipulates that Israelis have to hunt any settlement activity
during the
phase one (inaudible)? It's getting in it (inaudible)?

SECRETARY RICE: What I've heard is that both parties understand that they
both have obligations under phase one of the roadmap and they full well know
what they are. They're still valid.

QUESTION:And just looking back to the security, while (inaudible) there,
he's more difficult to (inaudible)?

SECRETARY RICE: I think they're all doing hard things in phase one. The real
breakthrough, it was actually a few months ago now, is that for a long time,
if you remember, the argument was you couldn't talk about the Palestinian
state or core issues, which was in phase three, until you had completed
phase one, which got us into an extended kind of circular problem for a long
time about phase one. Well, that -- now we've broken through and they are,
indeed, talking about phase -- what's in phase three, which is the
establishment of a Palestinian state.

But it obviously wouldn't work unless phase one is actually implemented and
it's just a practical matter. It would not work unless -- if you just read
the -- I'd just encourage you to go read the phase one obligations and ask
yourself, could you imagine establishing a Palestinian state without having
met the phase one obligations? It just wouldn't work.

MR. MCCORMACK: Who wants the final question?

SECRETARY RICE: Nobody.

QUESTION:I'll cover it.

(Laughter.)

QUESTION:Just looking ahead to tomorrow just for a moment, are you going to
raise with Abu Mazen the meeting he had last week with Hamas officials?

SECRETARY RICE: My --

QUESTION:(Inaudible.)

SECRETARY RICE: Well, it would be concerning if -- you know, if it looked
like he was -- he said that he's not going to negotiate with Hamas, you
know, with Hamas occupying Gaza and current circumstances. And I trust him
to keep that obligation. I understand that the meeting yesterday was with
some people who sought him out, not Hamas leadership who sought him out. And
I -- you know, I will, of course, ask him about it but I'm not troubled by
it.

QUESTION:And the final thought?

SECRETARY RICE: Uh-huh.

QUESTION:Is that -- have the Israelis today presented to you their proposals
on paper? Do you expect the Palestinians to do that tomorrow or not?

SECRETARY RICE: I don't expect that today or tomorrow.

QUESTION:You haven't got --

SECRETARY RICE: I -- no, I -- this is a document that, again, is evolving as
people's expectations evolve about what they're going to do after Annapolis.
I last spoke with Musharraf on Wednesday, October 31st.

**MR. MCCORMACK: October 31th.
(Laughter.)
2007/T18-8