[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 42, Number 21 (Monday, May 29, 2006)]
[Pages 997-1002]
[Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

<R04>
News Conference With Prime Minister Ehud Olmert of Israel

May 23, 2006

    President Bush. Thank you. Mr. Prime Minister, welcome. I'm 
particularly pleased to welcome Mrs. Olmert to the White House as well. 
Thanks for coming.
    The Prime Minister and I have known each other since 1998, when he 
was the mayor of Jerusalem, and I was the Governor of Texas. And I 
remember you greeting me in your office there, and you probably thought 
you were going to be the Prime Minister--I wasn't sure if I was going to 
be the President. [Laughter]
    We've just had a really productive meeting. We reaffirmed the deep 
and abiding ties between Israel and the United States. And those ties 
include our commitment to democracy and our strong belief that everybody 
has the right to worship freely. The ties include growing trade and 
economic relationships. The ties include important educational exchange 
programs that allow Israeli students to study at American colleges and 
universities, and American students to travel and study in Israel.
    In our meeting, the Prime Minister and I recalled the great 
contributions to peace made by Ariel Sharon. I asked the Prime Minister 
to convey my very best wishes to Ariel Sharon's sons.
    Prime Minister Olmert and I discussed peace and security in the 
Middle East, which the people of Israel seek and the American people 
support. In 2002, I outlined my vision of two democratic states, Israel 
and Palestine, living side by side in peace and security. Prime Minister 
Olmert told me that he and his Government share this vision. The 
international community seeks to realize this goal to the roadmap, which 
calls for a comprehensive settlement that resolves all outstanding 
issues between Israelis and Palestinians. I believe, and Prime Minister 
Olmert agrees, that a negotiated final status agreement best serves both 
the Israelis and the Palestinians and the cause of peace.
    Palestinian Authority President Abbas favors and speaks out for 
peace and negotiations. Yet the Hamas-led Palestinian Government does 
not. Hamas needs to make a strategic choice for peace. The United States 
and the international community have made clear that Hamas must 
recognize Israel's right to exist, must abandon terror, and must accept 
all previous agreements between the Palestinian Authority and Israel. No 
country can be expected to make peace with those who deny its right to 
exist and who use terror to attack its population.
    Today Prime Minister Olmert shared with me some of his ideas; I 
would call them bold ideas. These ideas could lead to a two-state 
solution if a pathway to progress on the roadmap is not open in the 
period ahead. His ideas include the removal of most Israeli settlements, 
except for the major Israeli population centers in the West Bank. This 
idea would follow Prime Minister Sharon's decision to remove all 
settlements in Gaza and several in the West Bank.
    I look forward to learning more about the Prime Minister's ideas. 
While any final status agreement will be only achieved on the basis of 
mutually agreed changes, and no party should prejudice the outcome of 
negotiations on a final status agreement, the Prime Minister's ideas 
could be an important step toward the peace we both support. I'm 
encouraged by his constructive efforts to find ways to move the peace 
process forward.
    And finally, the Prime Minister and I shared our concerns about the 
Iranian regime's nuclear weapons ambitions. The United States and the 
international community have made our common position clear: We're 
determined that the Iranian regime must not gain nuclear weapons.
    I told the Prime Minister what I've stated publicly before: Israel 
is a close friend and ally of the United States, and in the event of any 
attack on Israel, the United States will come to Israel's aid. The 
United States is strongly committed, and I'm strongly committed, to the 
security of Israel as a vibrant Jewish state.
    I look forward to our continuing discussions after this press 
conference. I'm not sure the delegations realize this yet, but we're 
going to shed ourselves of our delegations and the Prime Minister and I 
are going to go up to the Residence and sit down and have a continued 
dialog. And if we decide to brief our delegations on what we discuss,

[[Page 998]]

we will do so. But if not, they're going to have to guess. [Laughter] 
And then I'm looking forward to dinner.
    Welcome.
    Prime Minister Olmert. Thank you, Mr. President. I thank you for 
your kind invitation to visit Washington, and for the opportunity to 
meet with you and discuss the many issues on our common agenda. Our 
meeting was enlightening, and I look forward to working closely with you 
in the coming years to deepen the friendship, understanding, and 
bilateral ties between the United States and Israel.
    I also recall our meeting in the city hall when you and I were 
strolling around the beautiful building, at the terrace on the sixth 
floor, watching the walls of the city of Jerusalem. At that time you 
were the Governor; I was the mayor, and I think none of us thought that 
the day would come that I will have the honor and the privilege of being 
hosted by you, as President of the United States and Prime Minister of 
Israel.
    I could sense then your deep connection to the Holy Land, and your 
friendship and commitment to the State of Israel. I must say, Mr. 
President, that my instincts did not fail me. I, and the entire people 
of Israel, appreciate your true friendship and unwavering commitment to 
Israel's security and its well-being as a vibrant Jewish state.
    Your involvement in the Middle East and personal contribution to the 
efforts towards resolving the Israel-Palestinian conflict has been 
significant. The vision, which you outlined in your historic speech of 
June 2002, of two democratic states living side by side in peace and 
security, is the basis of any progress towards the solution in this 
region. Your unreserved support of the disengagement plan and your 
letter of April 14, 2004, to Prime Minister Ariel Sharon--and I join you 
in praying for his recovery--were the basis for the success of its 
implementation. What you immediately recognized to be an historic step 
was later adopted by all those who were skeptical in the beginning.
    I intend to exhaust every possibility to promote peace with the 
Palestinians according to the roadmap, and I extend my hand in peace to 
Mahmoud Abbas, the elected President of the Palestinian Authority. I 
hope he will take the necessary steps which he committed to in order to 
move forward.
    Unfortunately, the rise of Hamas, a terrorist organization which 
refuses to recognize Israel's right to exist and regards terrorism as a 
legitimate tool, severely undermines the possibility of promoting a 
genuine peace process. As you stated, Mr. President, the Palestinian 
Authority headed by Hamas Government must abandon the path of terrorism, 
dismantle the terror infrastructure, honor agreements, and recognize 
Israel's right to exist. By doing so they will find us a willing partner 
in peace. However, we will not enter into any kind of partnership with a 
party which refuses to recognize our right to live in peace and 
security.
    Despite our sincere desire for negotiations, we cannot wait 
indefinitely for the Palestinians to change. We cannot be held hostage 
by a terrorist entity which refuses to change or to promote dialog. If 
we come to the conclusion that no progress is possible, we will be 
compelled to try a different route.
    I presented to the President ideas which I believe could help 
advance his vision and prevent a political stalemate. According to these 
ideas, we will remove most of the settlements which are not part of the 
major Israeli population centers in Judea and Samaria. The settlements 
within the population centers would remain under Israeli control and 
become part of the State of Israel as part of the final status 
agreement. This process of realignment would reduce friction between 
Israelis and Palestinians, ensure territorial contiguity for the 
Palestinians, and guarantee Israel's security as a Jewish state with the 
borders it desires.
    The implementation of these ideas would only be possible with the 
comprehensive support of the United States and the international 
community. I anticipate working with you to explore ways to advance 
this.
    We discussed the Iranian issue. The Iranian regime, which calls for 
Israel's destruction, openly denies the Holocaust, and views the United 
States as its enemy, makes every effort to implement its fundamentalist 
religious ideology and blatantly disregards the demands of the 
international community. The Iranian threat is not only a threat to 
Israel, it is a threat to the stability of the

[[Page 999]]

Middle East and the entire world. And it could mark the beginning of a 
dangerous and irresponsible arms race in the Middle East.
    Mr. President, we appreciate your efforts to curb Iran's nuclear 
ambitions, including through the U.N. Security Council. They are of 
crucial importance. The international community cannot tolerate a 
situation where a regime with a radical ideology and a long tradition of 
irresponsible conduct becomes a nuclear weapons state. This is a moment 
of truth. It is still not too late to prevent it from happening.
    I thank you again for your gracious hospitality and for our 
discussions. I look forward to continue working with you, Mr. President. 
Thank you very much.
    President Bush. We'll take two questions a side, starting with Steve 
Holland [Reuters].

Middle East Peace Process

    Q. You mentioned that the West Bank plan could be an important step. 
Doesn't this sweep away the U.S. principle of a negotiated two-state 
solution? And should the Palestinian side approve any plan that would 
establish Israel's final borders?
    President Bush. You just heard the Prime Minister say that he's 
going to exhaust all options to negotiate, that he wants to reach out a 
hand to President Abbas. And I agree. I said in my opening statement 
that the best solution is one in which there's a negotiated final 
status. And we discussed--we spent ways--we spent some time discussing 
about how it's important to get a Palestinian President to the table. 
And the Prime Minister says he looks forward to discussing the issue.
    And so our preferred option, of course, is there to be a negotiated 
settlement. On the other hand, as the Prime Minister said, that if he's 
unable to find a partner in peace, if nothing can go forward, he is 
willing to think about ways to advance the process forward.
    And in order to solve this problem, there needs to be willingness to 
take the lead and creativity and the desire to follow through on the 
vision. The most important aspect about peace is to have a vision for 
peace. And I appreciate the Prime Minister's vision of two states side 
by side--two democratic states side by side in peace. That's possible.
    And so what I come away from the meeting with is that the Prime 
Minister, one, has a vision; two, willing to reach out to determine 
whether or not that vision exists with the Palestinian President, which 
I think it does; three, is willing to work to see whether or not it is 
possible for two sides to come together, and if not, is still willing to 
consider other ways to move the process forward. That's, to me, a very 
positive statement.
    Q. You said you wanted to hear more. Is there anything that worries 
you about this plan?
    President Bush. No, the only thing that worries me about the plan is 
that Hamas has said they want to destroy Israel. And the reason that 
worries me is, how can you have two states side by side in peace if one 
of the partners does not recognize the other state's right to exist? 
It's illogical for somebody to say, I'm for a state side by side with 
another state, and yet I don't want the state to exist. And so we spent 
time talking about Hamas, and I assured the Prime Minister that our 
position is steady and strong, that Hamas must change.
    Now, we care about the Palestinian people--and I say, ``we,'' both 
of us--he can speak for himself on this issue--but we are trying to set 
up a mechanism that supports the Palestinian people. Our beef is not 
with the Palestinian people. Our beef is with the Government that--a 
group in the Government that says they don't recognize Israel. And so 
the United States, we're working with the Europeans--Condi's people in 
the State Department are working with the Europeans to come up with a 
mechanism to get food and medicine and aid to the Palestinians.
    You may want to comment on it yourself, Mr. Prime Minister.
    Prime Minister Olmert. Thank you, Mr. President. Indeed, the 
Government, Sunday, decided to spend 50 million shekels buying medical 
equipment--50 million shekels, about $11 million--for the time being, to 
buy medical equipment and drugs needed for the hospitals in Gaza. And as 
I said during the Cabinet meeting, we will spend any amount of money 
needed in order to save lives of innocent Palestinians suffering from 
the indifference of their Government. We will not hesitate to do it. We 
will use the revenues

[[Page 1000]]

that we have collected, and more if necessary. We will make 
arrangements, together with our friends, so that the supplies will 
arrive directly to those who need them.
    This is a humanitarian commitment. We are absolutely committed to 
help innocent people that suffer from the brutality and the 
intransigence of their own Government, and we will continue to do it at 
all times.
    Thank you, Mr. President.

Iran

    Q. Mr. Prime Minister, are you satisfied from what you have learned 
out of your meeting with the President with regard of the Iranian issue? 
And what's your message to the Israeli public about this issue?
    And, Mr. President, with your permission, there is a military 
option, from your point of view, to solve the threat of the Iranian 
problem, their work on--to getting nuclear weapons?
    Prime Minister Olmert. The Iranian issue was discussed, indeed, 
between the President and myself. And we'll continue to talk about it 
later. Obviously, there is a major threat posed, as I've said already 
and the President said, by the Iranians and their attempts to have 
nonconventional capabilities and also to build up delivery systems and 
the ballistic missiles that can hit major centers all across Europe, not 
just in the Middle East.
    This is something that needs to be stopped. We discussed this issue 
at length, and there is a total agreement and understanding between the 
President and myself that there is a need to stop it. And we reviewed 
the different ways how to do it, and I am very satisfied with what I 
heard from the President and on what we agreed that we would continue to 
do in order to achieve this goal.
    President Bush. Our primary objective is to solve this problem 
diplomatically. I've told the American people that I will, on all 
issues, will try diplomacy first and exhaust diplomacy. And I explained 
to the Prime Minister that--about our diplomatic efforts--the most 
important thing in diplomacy is that there be a shared goal and--in 
other words, you have to have a common objective, a common goal in order 
to get people to come together around it. And now we have got a common 
goal throughout most of the world, and that is, Iran should not have a 
nuclear weapon. And that's important, and we are now working the 
diplomatic front around that goal.
    We have a variety of options, one of which, of course, is the United 
Nations Security Council, if the Iranians aren't willing to show 
progress toward that goal. We're working very closely with what's called 
the EU-3. That's Germany, England, and France. And I've been pleased and 
Secretary of State Rice has been pleased about their willingness to stay 
tough on the goal, of achieving the goal. Sometimes when you've got a 
variety of negotiating parties, it's easier for one--a nontransparent 
negotiator to pick off a weak link. And yet they've been firm, and 
that's important for Israel to know. It's important for me to praise our 
partners for that strength of purpose.
    Obviously, there's other parties we have to work with, including 
Russia and China. In other words, you can't get anything out of the U.N. 
Security Council unless there's an agreement that the Iranians are not 
negotiating in good faith and aren't willing to go forward. And so we're 
spending a lot of time working with our Russian friends, in particular, 
to make it clear to them that Iran is showing no good faith.
    And one of the interesting issues that the Iranians have tossed out 
in this debate is that they believe they have the sovereign right for 
civilian nuclear power. And my position has been, fine, it's just you 
just don't get to enrich the fuel necessary for the plant. And so we 
provided a--I thought--a very interesting opportunity for them--to say, 
if you want civilian nuclear power, you can have your plant and the 
international consortium will provide the fuel for the plant. And we'll 
pick up the spent fuel from the plant. And this was a very realistic and 
reasonable approach--and has been rejected by the Iranians.
    And so I say to our friends in our consortium, I'm not so sure these 
people really do want a solution, and therefore, let us make sure that 
we're willing to be working together in the U.N. Security Council. 
That's where we are. We're headed--we're on the cusp of going to the 
Security Council. And I repeat to your question, obviously, we'd like to 
solve

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this issue peacefully and diplomatically. And the more the Iranians 
refuse to negotiate in good faith, the more countries are beginning to 
realize that we must continue to work together.
    Martha [Martha Raddatz, ABC News]. Yes, you.

Progress in Iraq

    Q. If we can switch to Iraq, sir.
    President Bush. Iraq. Okay.
    Q. I know that this is something you're leaving up to your 
commanders, but from what you've heard from your commanders, how 
confident are you that you can start drawing down troops by the end of 
the year?
    President Bush. First of all, we are making progress in achieving 
our objective of training the Iraqis to take the fight to the enemy. And 
the reason I know that is because I talk to our commanders quite 
frequently. And we're making good political progress, as the world saw 
in the formation of a unity government. The Government has yet to get 
their full Cabinet in place, although we think that will happen 
relatively quickly. And then this sovereign Government is going to 
assess their security situation and their security forces and their 
needs, and work with our commanders. We haven't gotten to the point yet 
where the new Government is sitting down with our commanders to come up 
with a joint way forward.
    However, having said that, this is a new chapter in our 
relationship. In other words, we're now able to take a new assessment 
about the needs necessary for the Iraqis. And when I get that report 
from our commanders, I'll share it with others and you.
    Q. Sir, can I just add----
    President Bush. Please----
    Q. The U.S. has the most powerful military in the world, and they 
have been unable to bring down the violence in any substantial way in 
several of the provinces. So how can you expect the Iraqis to do that?
    President Bush. If one were to measure progress on the number of 
suiciders, if that's your definition of success, I think it gives--I 
think it will--I think it obscures the steady, incremental march toward 
democracy we're seeing. In other words, it's very difficult--you can 
have the most powerful army of the world--ask the Israelis what it's 
like to try to stop suiciders--it is a difficult task to stop suicide 
bombers. That's the--but that's one of the main--that's the main weapon 
of the enemy, the capacity to destroy innocent life with a suicider.
    And so I view progress as, is there a political process going 
forward that's convincing disaffected Sunnis, for example, to 
participate? Is there a unity government that says it's best for all of 
us to work together to achieve a common objective, which is democracy? 
Are we able to meet the needs of the 12 million people that defied the 
car bombers? To me, that's success. Trying to stop suiciders--which 
we're doing a pretty good job of on occasion--is difficult to do. And 
what the Iraqis are going to have to eventually do is convince those who 
are conducting suiciders who are not inspired by Al Qaida, for example, 
to realize there's a peaceful tomorrow. And those who are being inspired 
by Al Qaida, we're just going to have to stay on the hunt and bring Al 
Qaida to justice. And our Army can do that, and is doing that right now.

Israel's Disengagement Plan/Moving the Peace Process Forward

    Q. Mr. President, the Prime Minister just said that the settlement 
blocks, the major population centers will be part of Israel, annexed to 
Israel in the future. Do you support that? Would the United States 
sanction that?
    And, Mr. Prime Minister, can you give us some assessment of the time 
that you are willing to wait for the emergence of a Palestinian partner?
    President Bush. My answer to your question is, refer to my April 
14th, 2004, letter. I believed it when I wrote it, and I still believe 
it. [Laughter]
    Q. [Inaudible]
    President Bush. ----rare that I wrote the letter, or rare that I 
believed what I wrote? [Laughter]
    Prime Minister Olmert. First of all, I want to emphasize again what 
I said before--and what I said before the elections and immediately 
after the elections in Israel, and when my Government was inaugurated in 
the Knesset just a couple of weeks ago. I said

[[Page 1002]]

that we will make a genuine effort to negotiate with the Palestinian 
side on the basis of the roadmap, which is the framework for future 
negotiations towards, hopefully, a peace agreement between us and the 
Palestinians.
    I meant precisely what I said. I'll make every possible effort. And 
in order to examine it carefully and seriously, I will certainly meet 
with the elected President of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas. 
We haven't yet decided about the timing. It will be in the near future. 
And I will do everything that I can in order to help create the 
necessary circumstances for such negotiations to take place, providing, 
of course, that the Palestinian partner will have to not just to make a 
public commitment but to be able to deliver on the basic requirements of 
the roadmap and the Quartet decisions, namely to recognize the State of 
Israel and its right to exist as a Jewish state, to unarm the terrorist 
organizations, and to implement all the obligations of the agreement 
signed between the State of Israel and the Palestinian Authority.
    So we will make an effort. And I say time and again that we accept 
the sincerity of Mahmoud Abbas as the elected President of the 
Palestinian Authority. He is genuine; he is sincere; and we hope that he 
will have the power to be able to meet the requirements necessary for 
negotiations between us and the Palestinians. How soon it will be? The 
sooner, the better. I don't want to prejudge it at this point. I think 
it's too early. And I didn't come with a timetable to meet with the 
President of the United States.
    We shared our observations. I entirely agree with the vision of the 
President as it was outlined so brilliantly in the famous speech in June 
of 2002, which really set the course for all the developments that took 
place in the Middle East since then and created the possibility for, 
ultimately, the disengagement, which was a turning point in the history 
of the Middle East. And we are grateful to the President for the courage 
that he manifested then in presenting this outline and in being the 
first to support the disengagement, and carry on in spite of the 
difficulties and the skepticism and the question marks posed by 
different countries at the beginning. Most of them joined in later.
    So we are anxious to have negotiations. And we will look and find 
every possible avenue to help establish a process of negotiations on the 
basis of these conditions. However, as I said, we will not wait 
indefinitely. If we will reach the conclusion that in spite of all these 
efforts, it is impossible to implement the principles of the roadmap 
through a negotiating process, we'll look for other ways to implement 
these principles and to ultimately create a situation where there are 
secured borders for the State of Israel with the population centers in 
the territories as part of a State of Israel and with a contiguous 
territory that will allow the Palestinians to establish their own 
Palestinian state alongside the State of Israel. And hopefully, this is 
something that will happen within the next three to four years.
    Again, I am grateful to the President for the efforts that he was 
making and for his willingness to examine together with me these new 
ideas--as he called them, bold ideas--in the event that all other 
options will not be possible.
    Thank you.
    President Bush. Good job.

Note: The President's news conference began at 5:05 p.m. in the East 
Room at the White House. In his remarks, he referred to Aliza Olmert, 
wife of Prime Minister Olmert; former Prime Minister Ariel Sharon of 
Israel and his sons, Omri and Gilad; and President Mahmoud Abbas (Abu 
Mazen) of the Palestinian Authority.