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 In a speech prepared for delivery to the Knesset, or parliament, Bush pledged that the United States has an unbreakable bond with Israel.
"Some people suggest that if the United States would just break ties with Israel, all our problems in the Middle East would go away," Bush said in his prepared address. "This is a tired argument that buys into the propaganda of our enemies, and America rejects it utterly. Israel's population may be just over 7 million. But when you confront terror and evil, you are 307 million strong, because America stands with you."
Bush took special aim at Iran and said the United States stands with Israel in opposing moves by Tehran to obtain nuclear weapons.
"Permitting the world's leading sponsor of terror to possess the world's deadliest weapon would be an unforgivable betrayal of future generations," the president said. "For the sake of peace, the world must not allow Iran to have a nuclear weapon."
Bush previously has set a goal of reaching an Israeli-Palestinian agreement before the end of his term. But with just eight months remaining in his presidency, Bush's speech offered no suggestions on how to resolve the thorniest disputes over the borders of an eventual Palestinian state, the status of Jerusalem and its contested holy sites and the rights of Palestinians to return to land inside present-day Israel.
There was only one mention of the Palestinians in Bush's prepared remarks and no timetable for achieving a Palestinian state. The only reference came in a passage envisioning the future of Israel 60 years from now.
"Israel will be celebrating its 120th anniversary as one of the world's great democracies, a secure and flourishing homeland for the Jewish people," Bush said. "The Palestinian people will have the homeland they have long dreamed of and deserved a democratic state that is governed by law, respects human rights, and rejects terror.
"From Cairo and Riyadh to Baghdad and Beirut, people will live in free and independent societies, where a desire for peace is reinforced by ties of diplomacy, tourism, and trade. Iran and Syria will be peaceful nations, where today's oppression is a distant memory and people are free to speak their minds and develop their talents. And al-Qaida, Hezbollah, and Hamas will be defeated, as Muslims across the region recognize the emptiness of the terrorists' vision and the injustice of their cause."
The effort to reach an Israeli-Palestinian accord this year seemed increasingly unlikely even before Bush's trip. And fresh difficulties greeted him upon arrival, with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert weakened by a widening corruption probe and talk of possible new settlement activity in the West Bank. There also have been new bursts of violence
-- a deadly Israeli military raid into the Gaza Strip, which is controlled by Hamas, and a jarring rocket attack by militants, operating in Hamas-controlled territory, on a crowded shopping center in southern Israel.
"The killers claim the mantle of Islam, but they are not religious men," Bush said. "No one who prays to the God of Abraham could strap a suicide vest to an innocent child, or blow up guiltless guests at a Passover Seder, or fly planes into office buildings filled with unsuspecting workers."
Bush said that those who carry out such violent acts are serving only their own desire for power.
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 "They accept no God before themselves. And they reserve a special hatred for the most ardent defenders of liberty, including Americans and Israelis," Bush said. "That is why the founding charter of Hamas calls for the `elimination' of Israel. That is why the followers of Hezbollah chant `Death to Israel, Death to America!' That is why Osama bin Laden teaches that `the killing of Jews and Americans is one of the biggest duties.' And that is why the president of Iran dreams of returning the Middle East to the Middle Ages and calls for Israel to be wiped off the map."
While Israel marked its 60th anniversary, Palestinians marked the 60th anniversary of their uprooting
-- an annual ritual of mourning. In the West Bank, rallies, sirens and the launch of thousands of black balloons were to commemorate the displacement of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians during the 1948 war over Israel's creation.
The Palestinian economy remains stagnant, despite a massive injection of foreign aid, in part because of Israel's reluctance to ease its restrictions on movement and trade. Bush was meeting Thursday with international Mideast envoy Tony Blair for an update on progress for improving Palestinian civic institutions and economic conditions.
Meanwhile, the separation is deepening between Hamas-run Gaza and the West Bank led by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, who is to meet with Bush later this week in Egypt. The rivals are not on speaking terms, and the two territories that were to make up the future state are cut off from one another by Israeli travel bans.
Before his scheduled speech to the Knesset, Bush toured Masada, the ancient fortress on a plateau in the desert overlooking the Dead Sea. It is said to be the place where Jewish rebels killed themselves and each other 2,000 years ago rather than fall into slavery under the Romans.
The dramatic story has played an important role in Israel's national mythology. Remains were recognized as Jewish heroes by Israel's government in 1969, complete with a state burial, and army units used to be sworn in on the mountaintop to cries of "Masada will not fall again." More recently, the suicide story has come into doubt and Israelis have become less comfortable in any case with glorifying mass suicide and identifying with religious fanatics.
Bush took a hair-raising cable car ride up the side of the cliff and past ruins of camps that the Romans used in their three-month siege of the Jewish fortress. Once atop the plateau, Bush and first lady Laura Bush, accompanied by Olmert, strolled through the rocky, sun-baked area. They viewed a 29-room storeroom complex, famous frescoes, a large bathhouse, synagogue and a Byzantine church. The Masada is the last stronghold of the Jews against the Romans. Its violent destruction brought about the end of the kingdom of Judea.
[Associated
Press; By JENNIFER LOVEN]
Associated Press Writers Dalia Nammari in Ramallah and Karin Laub in Jerusalem contributed to this report.
Copyright 2008 The Associated
Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published,
broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
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