PM in U.S.: Ma'aleh Adumim will be linked to Jerusalem

September 19, 2005

Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, speaking to U.S. Jewish figures in remarks broadcast Monday, pledged that the West Bank settlement city of Ma'aleh Adumim will be linked to Jerusalem.

Sharon's remarks came as the outgoing U.S. ambassador to Israel said that President George W. Bush would back an Israeli government request to keep larger West Bank settlement areas under its control in a permanent peace agreement with the Palestinians.

To applause, Sharon declared, "Ma'aleh Adumim, the most beautiful town in the most beautiful area there - it's really unbelievable - will be connected to Jerusalem."

Ma'aleh Adumim, several kilometers from Jerusalem, is one of the blocs in question. The area known as E1, which links the cities, has been the focus of a flurry of reports over Israeli plans to build in the zone.

Palestinians have voiced fears that Israel intends to settle the West Bank such that the northern half is effectively severed from the south.

Israel has stated that it will build a police station in E1 as well as scores of new housing units. But it has denied reports of plans to build thousands of homes.

In remarks broadcast on Israel Radio, the prime minister turned aside the Palestinian suggestions that Samaria, the northern half of the West Bank, would be cut off from Judea, the southern part.

"I think that we have answers to these issues," Sharon said. "They will be connected, and I don't think that this will become a problem."

According to Sharon, Israel is examining several options for maintaining links between the north and the south. He did not elaborate.

Kurtzer remarks spark anger

Outgoing U.S. Ambassador Daniel Kurtzer said in an interview broadcast Sunday that Bush would back a request by Israel to retain some West Bank settlement blocs under a permanent peace deal with the Palestinians.

Palestinians reacted with anger to the comments, saying they would only encourage Israel to preempt final status negotiations.

Kurtzer, who completed his term Friday, cited an April 2004 letter from Bush to Sharon. "The policy is exactly what the president said," Kurtzer said in the prerecorded interview. "In the context of a final status agreement, the United States will support the retention by Israel of areas with a high concentration of Israeli population."

Kurtzer's language went slightly further than the original Bush letter, which did not speak of Israel retaining territory it captured in the 1967 Six-Day War, but said only that a return to the pre-war borders of 1949 was unlikely.

"In light of new realities on the ground, including already existing major Israeli populations centers, it is unrealistic to expect that the outcome of final status negotiations will be a full and complete return to the armistice lines of 1949," Bush wrote in the letter handed to Sharon during a visit to Washington on April 14 last year.

A senior Palestinian official, Saeb Erekat, said that the United States should remain unbiased in matters related to the final peace agreement between the sides.

"I believe this preempts and prejudges issues that are reserved for final status negotiations," Erekat said. "Any talk of preempting and prejudging is counterproductive to the peace process."

Kurtzer is to be succeeded by Richard H. Jones, who arrived in Israel on Sunday.

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