The Israelis Prepare for Bush Visit

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Mark Wilson / Getty

U.S. President George W. Bush

As President Bush prepares to visit Israel for the start of an eight-day tour of the Mideast, Israel has two chief issues on its mind: the Palestinians and Iran. But which one does the country want the American President to act on first? Iran.

In an interview Monday with Israel's Channel Two TV, Bush acknowledged that Iran and its nuclear ambitions remains a threat to Israel, weighing even more heavily than the Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations. What to do about Tehran is very likely to top Israel's agenda with Bush during this tour of the region.

Officials are reluctant to get into specifics over Iran. But Mark Regev, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's spokesman, told TIME: "We want to talk to the Americans about where we go from here, what steps have to be taken in the international community diplomatically. We would like to see heightened international pressure on the Iranians."

Gerald Steinberg, a strategic analyst at Bar-Ilan University near Tel Aviv, says that December's U.S. National Intelligence Estimate, which claimed that Iran had halted its nuclear weapons program in 2003, was a "major shock" to Israel. "This disrupted 15 years of Israeli policy based on working with the international coalition to pressure Iran to drop its nuclear weapons program through sanctions and the threat of military action, if necessary. Within two weeks, the momentum of the sanctions regime to contain Iran was suddenly reversed."

Steinberg believes that Bush will be pressed to find ways to repair the damage. "Beyond statements of continued concern about the dangers that will be created if the radical Iranian regime acquires nuclear weapons, the U.S. Administration will be asked to consider measures that will revive the stalled sanctions regime, and to consider the possibility of military action, if all other means have been exhausted."

On the Palestinian issue, Israel hopes Bush can restore the momentum generated by the Annapolis summit in November, which has since flagged. Spokesman Regev says: "We want to make sure that the energy level of the peace process remains in high gear. We want the President to support Palestinian pragmatists who believe in a negotiated solution and to lay out clearly his vision of two states." In his Israeli TV interview, Bush said he wanted an agreement on "what the Palestinian state would look like" by the time he left office. Regev still believes that is an attainable target: "If the Palestinians are serious, it's doable by the end of 2008."

Independent analysts, however, remain skeptical. Mark Heller, director of research at Tel Aviv University's Institute for National Security Studies, contends that the gaps on core issues — boundaries, Jerusalem, refugees, water resources, and security arrangements — had hardly been narrowed, let alone overcome. He questions whether the leadership on either side — with Olmert presiding over a shaky coalition and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas contending with the radical Islamists of Hamas who control the Gaza Strip — have the ability to "take the body politic by the scruff of the neck and shake it up."

On the Israeli side, Prime Minister Olmert has to persuade his voters that they are not being played for suckers. "[Olmert] doesn't feel that he'll be able to respond persuasively to the question 'What's in it for us?'" Heller maintains. "The obvious answer is peace and security, but he has to convince Israelis that a deal is a real deal. He's got to have an authoritative Palestinian leadership signing on the back of the check: 'This is the end. There are no further claims.' Abbas may be inclined to go in that direction, but he doesn't speak authoritatively for the Palestinians."