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As Biden heads to Israel, plan for proximity talks
advances<http://www.politico.com/blogs/laurarozen/0310/Final_push_for_proximity_talks_as_Biden_heads_to_Israel.html?showall#>

Middle East Peace Envoy George Mitchell arrived in Israel Saturday to try to
make the final push for the launch of indirect proximity talks between the
Israelis and Palestinians ahead of the arrival of Vice President Joseph
Biden in Israel Monday.

Mitchell met with Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak Saturday and with
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday. He is expected to meet
with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas Monday “in the hopes of announcing
the resumption of talks immediately afterward, Monday night,” Haaretz
reported <http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1154530.html>.

Palestinian officials were
reported<http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5ioi_0jtO9RjMwPNRoXNCndRPRq3gD9E9RMVG0>
to
give their nod to the talks Sunday.

"Another positive development," State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley told
POLITICO Sunday.

U.S. officials have been projecting increasing optimism in recent days
the talks would get underway. “I think we’re looking forward to [Mitchell's]
meetings on Sunday and Monday,” Crowley said Friday. “So let’s wait till
Monday and then I think we’ll have more to say about that," hinting at an
impending announcement.

The proximity talks would last for four months, with Mitchell and his team
traveling between the Israeli and Palestinian teams, either at home or in a
third country. The indirect talks are, however, not the direct final status
talks the Obama administration has spent a year trying to get relaunched.

The talks got an important boost last week when fourteen members of the Arab
League, meeting in Cairo, endorsed Abbas entering the proximity talks for
four months, even short of a full Israeli settlement freeze.

U.S. officials denied regional media
reports<http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1154406.html> that
the U.S. has provided written guarantees to the Palestinians that the U.S.
will assign blame if the talks run into obstacles, but suggested oral
assurances may have been written down by the Palestinians to become the
basis for such claims.

Vice President Joseph Biden
arrives<http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0310/33955.html> in
Israel later Monday, the highest level Obama administration official to date
to travel to the Jewish state. Accompanying Biden, Deputy Assistant
Secretary of State for Near East Affairs Maura Connelly, the NSC’s Iran and
Middle East strategist Dennis Ross, longtime advisor Tony Blinken, press
advisor Jay Carney, Middle East advisor Herro Mustafa. The NSC’s Senior
Director for the Middle East Dan Shapiro among others from Mitchell’s team
arrived ahead of Biden with Mitchell.

If Mitchell’s efforts succeed, Biden is expected to get to announce the
peace talks relaunch soon after his arrival.

Biden's visit is aimed at reassuring Israelis of the United States's
commitment to Israel's security and to reaffirm the special relationship
between the U.S. and Israel, an advisor told POLITICO.

Biden is due to give a speech to the Israeli people from Tel Aviv
University, in the pleasant, palmy Ramat Aviv suburb of Israel’s thriving
modern secular city, expected to highlight Israel's technological
innovation. He is also due to travel to the Palestinian capital
Ramallah, Jordan and possibly Egypt if Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak has
returned from surgery in Germany.

Biden will be the highest ranking of several senior U.S. civilian and
military officials who have traveled to Israel in the past six weeks to make
sure Washington and Jerusalem are "on the same page" on Iran, as Senate
Foreign Relations Committee Chairman John Kerry said on a trip there last
week. Among them, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Adm. Mike Mullen,
CIA Director Leon Panetta, National Security Advisor Jim Jones, Strategic
Command chief Gen. Kevin Chilton, Deputy Secretaries of State Jim Steinberg
and Jack Lew.

--
Eric D. Schwerin
Rosemont Seneca Partners
(202) 333-1880
eschwerin@rosemontseneca.co