[Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: George W. Bush (2007, Book I)]
[June 19, 2007]
[Pages 766-771]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]



Remarks Prior to Discussions With Prime Minister Ehud Olmert of Israel and an Exchange With Reporters
June 19, 2007

    President Bush. Mr. Prime Minister, thanks for coming. It's a--I've 
been looking forward to this visit. Last time we were together, we had a 
long and serious discussion about what we can do together to keep the 
peace.
    This visit comes obviously during a period of great concern for the 
world about what's taking place in Gaza, and so it's a timely visit. I'm 
looking forward to our discussions about how we can promote a common 
vision, a vision that speaks to the hopes and aspirations of the 
Palestinian people, and a vision that speaks to the security of Israel.
    I'm looking forward to sharing with the Prime Minister the results 
of a phone call I had yesterday with President Abbas. He is the President of all the Palestinians. He 
has spoken out for moderation. He is a voice that is a reasonable voice 
amongst the extremists in your neighborhood.
    You also come at an important moment, because there is yet again 
another moment for the world to see the great challenges we face in the 
21st century. We face extremists and radicals who use violence and 
murder as a tool to achieve objectives. And it's a chance, Mr. Prime 
Minister, for us to work on our bilateral relations, but also work on a 
common strategy to fight off those extremists and to promote a 
alternative ideology based upon human liberty and the human condition 
and freedom.
    And it's a great challenge. It's exciting to be in office during 
this period. It can be difficult for those of us who have been given the 
great honor of serving our countries, but it's an exciting moment. And 
I'm looking forward to working with a strong leader, a man committed to 
the security and prosperity of his country and, at the same time, 
committed to try to work the conditions necessary for peace.
    And so I'm glad to welcome a friend back at the Oval Office, and 
proud you're back.
    Prime Minister Olmert. Thank you very much, Mr. President. I am 
honored and delighted, after half a year almost, to be again a guest of 
yours, Mr. President, in the White House, and to discuss with you some 
of the kind of issues.
    As you have said already, this is a very special time. Things happen 
lately very dramatically. I'm sure that many people in the world were 
astounded by the brutality and the cruelty and the viciousness of the 
Hamas murderers that killed so many Palestinians in such a way. We who 
live in the Middle East--[inaudible]--some of us

[[Page 767]]

surprised, but not less outraged by these events.
    And I gladly share with you, Mr. President, the vision that, even 
under such circumstances, what we ought to do is to try and find 
opportunities for the future that align the situation. And I'm 
absolutely determined that there is an opportunity. And like you, I want 
to strengthen the moderates and cooperate with President Abu Mazen, who 
is President of all Palestinians, it is the only person who was widely 
elected in a democratic manner by all of the Palestinian people. And I 
am going to make every possible effort to cooperate with him and to move 
forward to see how to--can be--work jointly in order to provide the 
Palestinians with a real, genuine chance for a state of their own, 
fulfilling your vision, Mr. President, which I share, of a two-state 
solution and, at the same time, making sure that there is security for 
the people of Israel. And the people of Israel deserve security both in 
the south and in the north and in the east side of our country.
    I'm sure that we will find some time, also, to discuss other 
measures, such as the danger of Iran and the threats that come from the 
President of Iran, who talks time and again about the liquidation of the 
State of Israel, something that is totally intolerable and unacceptable. 
And we have to continue the measures taken in order to stop the Iranian 
efforts to establish nonconventional weapons.
    And again, I thank you for your friendship and for the power that 
you manifest and your dedication to the principles that you believe in. 
And I am proud to follow the same route to fight for the principles and 
to carry on. Thank you.
    President Bush. We'll answer a couple of questions, starting with 
Jennifer [Jennifer Loven, Associated Press].

Israeli-Palestinian Relations/Situation in the Middle East

    Q. Thank you, sir. Will you try to persuade, during the session with 
the Prime Minister, to reenter peace talks with Mr. Abbas?
    And to the Prime Minister: What do you think of the offer? And do 
you think it's possible to have peace with just half the Palestinian 
people?
    Prime Minister Olmert. I didn't hear the first part of the question.
    President Bush. Will I try to persuade you to enter talks.
    Prime Minister Olmert. Yes.
    President Bush. First of all, we share a common vision of two states 
living side by side in peace. And the reason why, at least, I think 
that's important--one, I think it's important for the moderate people, 
the ordinary Palestinians to have something to be for. I also think it's 
in Israel's interest to have a state. It's a demographic pressure that 
ultimately is going to make it very difficult for Israel to maintain its 
Jewishness as a state.
    So there's a practical reason as well as a moral reason for there to 
be discussions about a way forward to achieve a two-state solution. And 
the Prime Minister has said that he wants--you can ask him if he's going 
to talk to Abbas. I'm not going 
to put words in his mouth.
    Q. I did.
    President Bush. But what I'm trying to say, Jennifer, is that we 
share a common way forward. And our hope is, is that others in the 
region understand that this way forward leads to peace. People other 
than President Abbas and the 
Palestinians, we would hope that the Arab world supports such a concept. 
Inherent in that is Israel's right to exist. There needs to be solid 
recognition of this state's right to live in peace.
    At the same time, we want to have a vision for the Palestinians to 
see that there's a better tomorrow for them. These folks have been 
denied for a long period of time the right to a normal life, starting 
with leadership that failed them. And our hope is that President 
Abbas and that Prime Minister 
Fayyad, who is a good fellow, will be 
strengthened to the point where they

[[Page 768]]

can lead the Palestinians in a different direction, with a different 
hope.
    The Prime Minister has spoken to me and I have spoken to him about 
our desire to help suffering Palestinians. Nobody likes suffering on 
their border; nobody likes to see suffering in the world. And so we'll 
talk about that. We'll also talk about the broader war against 
extremists and radicals.
    It's interesting that extremists attack democracies around the 
Middle East, whether it be the Iraq democracy, the Lebanese democracy, 
or a potential Palestinian democracy. And what that should say clearly 
to people all around the world is that we are involved with an 
ideological conflict that is a monumental conflict. And those of us that 
believe in liberty and human rights and human decency need to be bound 
together in common cause to fight off these extremists and to defeat 
them.
    You can only defeat them so much militarily. We have to also defeat 
them with a better idea. It's a better idea that's being practiced by 
our friend Israel. It's called democracy. And that's the fundamental 
challenge facing this century: Will we have the courage and the resolve 
necessary to help democracy defeat this ideology? And I will tell the 
Prime Minister, once again, I'm deeply committed to this cause, whether 
it be in Iraq or Lebanon or the Palestinian Territory or anywhere else 
in the Middle East and around the world.

President Mahmoud Abbas of the 
Palestinian Authority

    Q. Will you enter into talks with Mr. Abbas?
    Prime Minister Olmert. Well, naturally, I think at this particular 
point, I'm sure the President will not have hard work to convince me, 
because I proposed to meet with President Abbas--in fact, I was--
initiated the idea that we will meet on a regular basis, biweekly, to 
discuss the matters. And I proposed that I even come to Jericho, 
something that no Prime Minister before me did.
    The President was having serious difficulties, some of which we have 
witnessed lately. And that's perhaps the reason why he had to cancel 
some of the meetings. But there's no question that I want to talk to the 
President of the Palestinian community, Mr. Abbas. I will be talking to 
him. The teams of both sides meet regularly every week and discuss on 
the matters.
    And the idea that I have is to talk with him of the current issues 
that can help upgrade the quality of life of the people and provide them 
better security in the West Bank and to share with him the efforts to 
calm the terror, this is something that he is absolutely committed to 
doing. We have to do it, and this is not something that the Palestinians 
can escape. They will help fight terror in a most effective way--
something that they haven't done, unfortunately, up until now. But this 
is something that I am sure he understands is a prerequisite for any 
major development in the future.
    But, of course, we also have to talk about a groundwork that needs 
to be done in order to allow us rapidly to talk about the creation of a 
Palestinian state. This is the main vision of my friend, President Bush. 
This is the vision that we share. This is the ultimate goal, to create 
the Palestinian state. We have to prepare the groundwork that will 
allow--soon, I hope--to be able to start serious negotiations about the 
creation of a Palestinian state.
    In order to achieve peace, we have to fight terror; we have to 
increase security; we have to upgrade the quality of life for the 
Palestinians. And, of course, the Palestinians have to establish a much 
more credible and serious administration that will be able to take care 
of their daily needs in an appropriate manner.

Israel-Syria Relations

    Q. Thank you.

[[Page 769]]

 [At this point, a reporter asked a question in Hebrew, and no 
translation was provided.]

    Q. Mr. President, the Prime Minister of----
    President Bush. What did you just ask him?
    Q. I asked him what Israel----
    President Bush. ----that's unfair. [Laughter]
    Q. I asked him what Israel will do with the refugees coming from 
Gaza.
    The President. Yes. Okay.
    Q. Will you deliver to the murderers' guns, or will they be taken to 
a refuge in the West Bank?
    And I would like to ask you: The Prime Minister of Israel calls for 
negotiation with no precondition with Syria; so does President Asad of 
Syria, and he asks for U.S. mediation--will you do it?
    President Bush. They can handle their own negotiations with Syria. 
If the Prime Minister wants to negotiate with Syria, he doesn't need me 
to mediate.

Situation in the Middle East

    Q. Do you think it's a good idea?
    President Bush. It's up to the Prime Minister. I haven't had a 
chance to talk to him about that. I don't know if you're putting words 
in his mouth or not. But I'm looking forward to having a discussion 
about Iran and Syria and the neighborhood. But this man is plenty 
capable of conducting his own negotiations without mediation.
    Prime Minister Olmert. Well, first of all, answer your question, 
right? We have been very, very attentive to the needs of the--
humanitarian needs of Gaza, and we will continue to provide everything 
that is necessary in order to meet these humanitarian needs. Israel will 
not be indifferent to the human suffering in Gaza. Israel will be 
different from the Palestinians themselves because the reality is that 
all this suffering is caused by Palestinians against their own people. 
What the Hamas was doing in Gaza is absolutely atrocious and 
intolerable. And I'm sure that many who had some hopes that maybe Hamas 
can be more reasonable and more restrained--I think--lost these hopes 
because of what they have been doing to their own people: killing 
innocent civilians, pulling out from hospital beds Fatah people that 
were wounded and dropped them off the fifth floor to kill them in the 
street, and terrible other things.
    We will not be indifferent. We already are taking care of many of 
the Palestinians in Gaza during the last few days, and we will continue 
to deal with it as it comes. Of course, they are not interested in 
staying in Israel. They want to be amongst Palestinians, and they will 
be treated in this manner.

Israel-Syria Relations

    Q. So you will let them go?
    Prime Minister Olmert. So, as I said, we will check every single 
case, and we'll see how we can help them. And I'm sure that we will help 
them.
    As for Syria, I'm afraid that you may have not have understood 
correctly what the Syrian leader said. The Syrian leader said that he is 
against any preconditions from the Israeli side, but he's certainly for 
preconditions from the Syrian side. One of the preconditions is that he 
wants President Bush to work more than he does already in regional 
issues and to be the mediator. And the President said correctly, this is 
not the--I think--the job for the President of the United States. He's 
got many other things to do. And I don't think that if someone wants to 
speak directly that he needs the involvement of America in order to 
allow these negotiations to take place.
    And I am not certain that the understanding of the President of 
Syria can lay the foundations for immediate discussions between Syria 
and Israel.
    President Bush. Matt [Matt Spetalnick, Reuters].

[[Page 770]]

Situation in the Middle East/Iraq

    Q. Mr. President, with Hamas's takeover of Gaza, aren't you 
effectively accepting a split between the two main Palestinian 
Territories? And what--how big of a blow is this to your vision of 
achieving agreement before the end of your term for a Palestinian state 
and Israel living side by side in peace?
    President Bush. First of all, we recognize the President of all the 
Palestinian people, and that's President Abu Mazen. He was elected; he's the President. Secondly, we 
recognize that it was Hamas that attacked the unity Government. They 
made a choice of violence. It was their decision that has caused there 
to be this current situation in the Middle East, about which we'll be 
spending some time discussing.
    Matt, the--what you're seeing now in this part of the 21st century 
is going to be played out over time. This is an ideological struggle. 
You--we're looking at the difference between a group of people that want 
to represent the Palestinians who believe in peace, that want a better 
way for their people, that believe in democracy; they need help to build 
the institutions necessary for democracy to flourish, and they need help 
to build security forces so that they can end up enforcing what most of 
the people want, which is to live in peace. And that's versus a group of 
radicals and extremists who are willing to use violence, unspeakable 
violence sometimes, to achieve a political objective.
    And the challenge is for those of us who believe there's a--
democracy can help yield the peace, is to continue to move forward. And 
that's what we'll be discussing about today: how to do so. The Prime 
Minister said he's willing to have discussions with the forces of 
moderation in the Palestinian Territory, laying the groundwork for 
serious discussions. I thought that's--that is a statement that shows 
that the Prime Minister is willing to move with a--to promote an 
alternative vision.
    You know, the world is going to be confronted with these choices: 
Are you willing to accept the fact that extremism is around and is 
willing to promote violence, or should we resist that? Should we not 
combine forces and efforts to promote alternatives to this vision? 
That's precisely what we're doing in Iraq. We strongly believe it's in 
the world's interest to support this young democracy. The--Al Qaida, the 
people that killed nearly 3,000 of our people here in the United States, 
are conducting major car bombs and acts of unspeakable violence in Iraq, 
trying to drive us out because they want to impose their vision on the 
Iraqi people.
    And so, Mr. Prime Minister, I'm committed to helping the Iraqis 
succeed with a democracy. It's in the interest of the Middle East that 
this democracy succeed, as an alternative, because if we were to fail, 
then all of a sudden, these extremists would have safe haven. Extremists 
in the Middle East would be emboldened by the failure of those of us who 
live a nice, comfortable existence not to help those who are struggling 
for freedom.
    And so it's the great challenge of our time, Matt. And there will be 
forward movement, and there will be setbacks. The fundamental question 
facing those of us who have offices is, do we have the determination and 
the will and the vision to present an alternative to these people? And I 
believe we do, and I believe that's the calling of our time.
    And so that's why I'm excited to be talking about it with a man who 
shares the vision that there is a better way than to accommodate and 
accept extremism and radicalism.

Iran

    Q. Mr. President--question. Regarding the ongoing attempts by Iran 
to acquire nuclear capability of atom bomb: Would you--are you willing 
to say at this time that a military action against Iran is no longer an 
option in light of the situation?

[[Page 771]]

    President Bush. I will tell you this, that my position hasn't 
changed, and that is, all options are on the table. I would hope that we 
could solve this diplomatically. It's--and that's why the United 
States--first of all, we take the threat very seriously. And I fully 
understand the concerns of any Israeli when they hear the voice of the 
man in Iran saying, on the one hand, we 
want to acquire the technologies and know-how to build a--enrich 
uranium, which could then be converted into a nuclear weapon, and, on 
the other hand, we want to destroy Israel. Look, if I were an Israeli 
citizen, I would view that as a serious threat to my security. And as a 
strong ally of Israel, I view that as a serious threat to the security--
I--not only the security of Israel but the security of the Middle East.
    That's why we are constantly working to remind our European friends, 
as well as Russia and other members of the U.N., we have an obligation 
to see if we can't work together to solve this issue diplomatically. 
That means to provide consequences to the Iranian Government if they 
continue to pursue a nuclear weapon, such as financial sanctions or 
economic sanctions. We want there to be a choice. We want people to see 
there's--you know, isolation-- there's got a consequence to it, that 
there's a price that's paid for this kind of intransigence and these 
threatening tones.
    And it's difficult work to keep the nations bound together to help 
deal with this issue diplomatically, but we have done a pretty good job 
so far. Now, whether or not they abandon their nuclear weapons program, 
we'll see. But at least we've got unanimity so far, speaking--at the 
U.N. Security Council--speaking pretty clearly that there will be 
consequences. And there are being--consequences; there's been some 
economic consequences beginning to affect the economy.
    Look, the Iranian people don't need to live under this kind of 
conditions. These are proud people with a great tradition. Their 
Government can do better for them. And threatening the world has caused 
there to be isolation. And these good folks could have leadership that 
enables them to have a better economy and a better way of life, an 
economy and a way of life that really does--enriches their families, 
that gives them a better chance to succeed. But, no, this group of 
people have made a different alternative, and now our job is to make 
sure that we continue to keep the pressure on.
    Listen, thank you all very much.

Note: The President spoke at 9:51 a.m. in the Oval Office at the White 
House. In his remarks, he referred to President Mahmoud Abbas and Prime 
Minister Salam Fayyad of the Palestinian Authority; and President Mahmud 
Ahmadi-nejad of Iran. Prime Minister Olmert referred to President Bashar 
al-Asad of Syria.