Obama launches fresh Middle East peace drive

THE United States launched a fresh drive yesterday to restart Middle East peace talks, sending senior officials to theregion to deal with issues ranging from Jewish settlements to Iran’s nuclear ambitions.

The visits by Middle East envoy George Mitchell, defence secretary Robert Gates and national security adviser Jim Jones were a strong signal from US President Barack Obama of his intention to keep Israeli-Arab peacemaking high on his agenda.

Obama’s demand, in accordance with a 2003 US-backed peace “road map”, to freeze Jewish settlement in the occupied West Bank and Arab East Jerusalem has met stiff resistance from Israeli Prime Minister BenjaminNetanyahu. Playing down the most serious rift in US-Israeli ties in a decade, Netanyahu told his cabinet: “It is only natural that, within a fabric of friendly relations between allies, there isn’t full agreement on all points.”