WORLD> Middle East
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WORLD> Middle East
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Obama calls Israel a 'miracle', vows staunch support
(Agencies)
Updated: 2008-07-23 22:55 Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat earlier said he hoped Israel and the Palestinians would forge a statehood agreement by the time US President George W. Bush steps down in January.
If not, Erekat said, Palestinians hoped Bush's successor would "stay the course" to pursue peace in a "serious, expeditious" manner. Obama, who faces Republican John McCain in the November election, dismayed Palestinian leaders when he said last month that Jerusalem should be Israel's "undivided" capital. Palestinians want Arab East Jerusalem, captured by Israel in 1967, as the capital of a future state. Obama later said he used "poor phrasing" when he made the remarks. Obama will stop on Wednesday in the Israeli town of Sderot, which sits near the border with the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip and has been hit by rockets fired by Palestinian militants. McCain visited Sderot in March and did not go to the West Bank. The cross-border rocket attacks, and Israeli military operations in the Gaza Strip, have largely subsided since an Egyptian-brokered ceasefire took hold last month. Obama arrived in Israel just hours after a Palestinian rammed a bulldozer into vehicles on a busy Jerusalem street near the hotel booked for his stay. The attacker wounded at least 16 people, one seriously, before being shot dead. Aides said that at Yad Vashem, Obama met an Israeli police officer who along with others shot the driver. It was unclear how the meeting was arranged. |
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