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Thousands Rally For Israel At U.N. As Powell Heads To Mideast
APRIL 07TH, 2002
As U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell departs to try to broker a cease-fire between the Israelis and Palestinians, over 10,000 people gathered outside U.N. headquarters in Manhattan to protest the Bush administration's demand for Israel to withdraw from the West Bank.
As U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell departs to try to broker a cease-fire between the Israelis and the Palestinians, over 10,000 people demonstrated near the United Nations headquarters in Midtown in support of Israel Sunday.
Rabbis and elected officials who spoke blasted President George Bush's demand that Israeli troops withdraw from the West Bank and called on Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to ignore the president's plea. Protestors at the passionate - though orderly - demonstration held up signs that called Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat a terrorist, as well is pictures of Israeli victims in the conflict.
"Telling Israel it has a right to fight terror but must withdraw before destroying the terrorist infrastructure is like America declaring it has the right to fight to fight terror but will, without delay withdraw from Afghanistan," said Rabbi Avi Weiss of the Hebrew Institute of Riverdale.
On Saturday, Bush called for Israeli forces to withdraw "without delay." Delivering the message directly in a 20-minute phone call that aides described as tense, Bush told Sharon that the Israeli besiegement of West Banks towns must end for the American peace initiative to have a chance at success.
Sharon promised to "expedite" the operation, but he offered no deadline for a withdrawal, nor did Bush go so far as to push for an exact timeline.
Powell is leaving for the Middle East Sunday night as the administration seeks a greater role in ending the conflict. It is still unknown whether the secretary of state will meet with Arafat, but Powell says he hopes to.
"I would try to see the chairman, as I have in the past, as well as try to see other Palestinian leaders," Powell said on NBC's "Meet the Press" Sunday morning. "I have to be able to talk to all sides, otherwise you will never move forward into a cease-fire and into a political solution."
A Palestinian cabinet secretary said Saturday that no Palestinian representatives will meet with Powell unless he visits Arafat at the compound in Ramallah where he has been surrounded by Israeli military forces for more than a week. That declaration came after President Bush criticized Arafat's leadership in his remarks Saturday, suggesting that peace can be achieved without Arafat's help.
Sunday's pro-Israel rally in Manhattan was just the latest in a series of demonstrations in support of both the Israelis and Palestinians in New York City in recent weeks, though the numbers have been growing. On Saturday, about 1,000 pro-Palestinian protestors rallied at Brooklyn Borough Hall and then marched across the Brooklyn Bridge to City Hall.