Washington: US President George W. Bush said on Saturday that his trip to the Middle East next week is aimed to promote peace between Israel and the Palestinians and curtail Iran's "aggressive ambitions".
He also laid blame on Syria for the stalemate that has prevented Lebanon from choosing a new president, saying Damascus was "thwarting the will of the Lebanese people."
"The Middle East is a region of great strategic importance to the United States, and I'm looking forward to my visit," Bush, who leaves on January 8 for the region, said in his weekly radio address.
The US president is making his first trip in office to Israel and his first ever trip to the West Bank, and visit Kuwait, Bahrain, the UAE, Saudi Arabia, and Egypt before returning to Washington on January 16.
Bush said he planned to push Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas to make progress on peace talks restarted at a US-championed conference in Annapolis, Maryland.
"This is difficult work. It will require tough decisions on complex questions. But I am optimistic about the prospects. And I will make clear that America is deeply committed to helping both parties," Bush said.
Decisive moment
He did not renew his confidence about creating an independent Palestinian state living at peace with Israel by the time he leaves office in January 2009 - the goal laid out at Annapolis. Bush said he would urge leaders at his other destinations to help move the process forward, and declared he would "will discuss the importance of countering the aggressive ambitions of Iran."
Bush said the Middle East faced a "decisive moment" in the struggle between democratic reformers and extremists.
"As we saw on September the 11th, 2001, dangers that arise on the other side of the world can bring death and destruction to our own streets," Bush said in his weekly radio address.
"Since then, extremists have assassinated democratic leaders from Afghanistan to Lebanon to Pakistan. They have murdered innocent people from Saudi Arabia to Jordan and Iraq."
Demand: Israeli raids must end
With days to go ahead of US President George W. Bush begins his tour of Middle East, Israeli troops wound up a four-day sweep of wanted men and munitions caches in the West Bank town of Nablus on Saturday.
Residents who had been confined to their homes since the operation began burst out on to the streets to survey damage and resume their interrupted lives.
Palestinian officials said more than 40 people were wounded in the operation, which together with ongoing Israeli-Palestinian clashes in Gaza, has cast a shadow on US President George W. Bush's upcoming visit to the region. They said Israel must put an end to incursions.
A leading Palestinian militant was hiding under a house where the Israeli military detonated seized explosives yesterday. But he was pulled out from the rubble unharmed and paraded through the streets of Nablus' Old City on the shoulders of cheering supporters.
- AP
