Post date: Mar 21, 2013 8:52:18 PM
Israelis voice scepticism after U.S President Barack Obama's keynote address in which he made direct peace appeal to the Israeli people.
TEL AVIV, ISRAEL (MARCH 21, 2013) (REUTERS) - Israelis on Thursday (March 21) voiced mixed feelings after hearingUnited States President Barack Obama delivering a keynote address in which he appealed directly to the Israeli people to put themselves in the shoes of stateless Palestinians and recognise that Jewish settlement activity in occupied territory hurts prospects for peace.
In a showcase speech in Jerusalem to Israeli university students, Obama coupled his plea with an acknowledgement of the Jewish state's security concerns in a region destabilised by the West's nuclear standoff with Iran and civil war in Syria.Obama, on his first official visit to Israel and the occupied West Bank, said only peace could bring true security, but he did not offer any new ideas on how to revive Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations, stalled since 2010.
In Tel Aviv, resident Din Azulay said the president's speech was good, but that it's the Israeli people who should make its own decisions.
"The Obama speech was a good speech but I think in the bottom line Obama is the president of the USA, not the president of Israel. We need to trust Benjamin Netanyahu, the Prime Minister, trust us, we need to decide which road do we go and not the Americans, not Obama," Azulay said.
Obama has received an effusive welcome in Israel since his arrival on Wednesday (March 20), hoping to reset his often troubled relationship with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Obama has faced the tough task of winning over sceptical Israelis after he bypassed their country in 2009 when visiting Egypt and offered a "new beginning" to the Muslim world in a
speech at Cairo University.
The mood was also tinged with disappointment in the West Bank city ofRamallah, which Obama visited before his Jerusalem speech. Meeting Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas for three hours, Obama pressed the Western-backed leader to drop his demand for a settlement freeze before peace talks can resume.
Earlier on Thursday, Palestinians in the Gaza Strip fired two rockets into Sderot, a southern Israeli town that Obama visited when running for president in 2008. Police said no one was hurt.
One of the city's residents, Adi Ammar, said he believed Obama but that more could be done for Israel's security.
"I believe him (Referring to U.S President Barack Obama) but the United Statesand Israel need to get closer so that we will truly feel safe. If they really wanted us to be safe, they would have done a little bit more, in regard to Iran and also regarding our security here," Ammar said after watching Obama's Jerusalemspeech.
In the West Bank, Jewish settlers and mayor of Efrat settlement Oded Revivicriticized Obama.
"Why give this speech in Israel to an audience that applause for any prospects of peace instead of going to Ramallah and giving that speech in Ramallah and seeing their response to any initiative of peace. We know what their answer is, we re-heard it today and therefore i completely don't see what was the relevance of the whole speech," said the mayor of Efrat settlement Oded Revivi.
But settler leader Danny Dayan said Obama should be praised for correcting his own mistakes.
"I must say I admire the ability of President Obama to acknowledge his own mistakes in his first years in office and to correct them, to change course. I think he understood the problem is not Israel and the Problem is not the settlements, but the intransigence of the Palestinians. I think President Obama understood that the Palestinians will not agree to the existence of Israel as a Jewish state and therefore a final status solution here is impossible," Dayan said after Obama's visit to Ramallah.
About 500,000 Israelis live in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, home to 2.5 million Palestinians. Most countries regard Israel's settlements as illegal. Israelcites historical
and Biblical roots to the West Bank and Jerusalem.
Obama, embarking on a second and final four-year term in the White House, has made clear he is not bringing any new peace initiatives and has instead has come to Israel and the Palestinian Territories on a "listening" tour.
But he said his new secretary of state, John Kerry, would spend a significant amount of time and energy trying to narrow differences between the two sides as the United States seeks to move them back to the negotiating table.