Obama Urges Global Support for Mideast Peace Efforts

23 September 2010

President Obama delivering his UN General Assembly address, 23 Sep 2010

The annual address to the General Assembly by the U.S. president is normally a wide-ranging compilation of the nation's foreign policy themes. Mr. Obama put unusual stress, though, on the U.S.-brokered direct Israeli-Palestinian peace talks that began early this month and aim at a two-state peace accord with a year.

The talks face an early hurdle amid Palestinian threats to walk out if Israel fails to extend a 10-month moratorium on most West Bank settlement activity that expires in a week. President Obama reiterated U.S. calls for an extension. He also appealed to Arab governments to actively support the peace process.

"Those who have signed on to the Arab Peace Initiative should seize this opportunity to make it real by taking tangible steps toward the normalization that it promises Israel," said the president. "And those who speak on behalf of Palestinian self-government should help the Palestinian Authority politically and financially, and in so doing, help the Palestinians build the institutions of their state."

The President said the rights of the Palestinians can be won only by peaceful means. He added that those who long to see an independent Palestine must "stop trying to tear down Israel."

"Efforts to chip away at Israel's legitimacy will only be met by the unshakeable opposition of the United States," said President Obama. "And efforts to threaten or kill Israelis will do nothing to help the Palestinian people. The slaughter of innocent Israelis is not resistance, it's injustice. Make no mistake - the courage of a man like [Palestinian] President [Mahmoud] Abbas - who stands up for his people in front of the world under very difficult circumstances - is far greater than those who fire rockets at innocent women and children."