It seems Israel’s patron the United states isn’t the only country that is less than enthusiastic about Israel and Syria’s decision to restart peace talks. So is Syria’s patron, Iran.
Unnamed sources told the London-based al-Sharq al-Awsat that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad apparently is furious with Syrian President Bashar Assad for engaging the Zionist entity in peace talks, according to this Ha’aretz report.
President Bush doesn’t seem too enthusiastic either, as JTA’s Ron Kampeas reports. As the New York Times points out in its lead editorial Friday, it seems Bush was taking a swipe not only at Barack Obama in his remarks last week in Israel’s Knesset about appeasing terrorists, but also at his Israeli hosts:
Everybody knew President Bush was aiming at Senator Barack Obama last week when he likened those who endorse talks with “terrorists and radicals” to appeasers of the Nazis. But now we know what Mr. Bush knew then that Israel is in indirect peace talks with Syria, a prominent member of Mr. Bush’s list of shunned nations and it seems as if the president was going for a two-for-one in his crack about appeasement.
For his part, Obama told the Jerusalem Post he backs the Israeli-Syrian peace talks.
Elsewhere in the Middle East, Egyptian-mediated indirect talks between Hamas and Israel on a ceasefire collapsed Thursday. And the war in the Gaza area goes on.
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