Hydrablog

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/07/28/AR2006072800240.html
In Asia, Rice Meets With Diplomats on Mideast
By Robin Wright, Jonathan Finer and Fred Barbash
Washington Post Staff Writers
Friday, July 28, 2006; 8:06 AM [US] [Israel’s 2-front war] [followup] [roughly day 16] [*****************] [“arab street siding with undergod, Hezbollah] [*************] [in today’s external and govt] [ditto]
KUALA LUMPUR, July 28 -- Amid growing divisions between the U.S., Europe and the Arab states over how and when to seek an end to the current Middle East war, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice Friday delayed her return to the region and huddled with diplomats in Malaysia on the sidelines of a meeting that was supposed to be about South East Asia.
Rice had been scheduled to depart late Friday for an undisclosed destination reportedly in the Middle East and many in her delegation had checked out of the hotel. But just hours before she was due to leave, her staff announced that she would remain in Kuala Lumpur until Saturday morning.
At a news conference later Friday, she said she would return to the Mideast but did not specify a time. "I do think it is important that groundwork be laid so I can make the most of whatever time I can spend there."
Meanwhile, British Prime Minister Tony Blair signaled impatience with the U.S. approach in advance of his meeting in Washington Friday with President Bush.
His spokesman said Blair will seek a U.N. Security Council resolution to resolve the fighting in the Mideast, wire services said, and that the British leader wants to "increase the urgency" of diplomacy to end the violence between Israel and Hezbollah. "We want to accelerate discussions that are going on among the international community, identifying those who would serve in a stabilization force, and increase the tempo of putting that stabilization force together," said the spokesman.
Blair faces mounting pressure within his Labor Party and among the British public generally to put greater distance between the British government and Bush, with regard both to the latest conflict between Israel and Hezbollah and the war in Iraq. The British press has been feasting on the accidentally broadcast conversation between Blair and Bush at the recent G 8 summit in Russia in which Bush summoned Blair with the words "yo, Blair," which has also been interpreted as "yeah Blair" rather than "yo."
"Yo, Bush!" said the London Tabloid Daily Mirror, "Start treating our prime minister with respect."
The violence continued unabated Friday. A Qassam rocket fired from the Gaza Strip landed near a kindergarten in Zikin, an Israeli coastal town south of Tel Aviv, lightly wounding two children, a military spokesman said.
Israel's Defense Ministry said that warplanes attacked weapon production and storage facilities used by the Hamas terror organization in northern Gaza. It said the air force also attacked two Hamas organization weapon storage and production facilities in Gaza, noting that it "warned the citizens of the neighborhoods before the attack, and instructed them not to stay in houses in which terror operatives are active. "
The Middle East has followed Rice to Malaysia. As America's top diplomat met Friday with several delegations at the Association of South East Asian Nations conference, more than 1,000 Malaysians carrying Hezbollah and Hamas flags broke through the security cordon around the convention center in Kuala Lumpur.
Protesters carried pictures of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah and angry anti-U.S. placards calling for Rice to "Burn in hell." Others signs called Israel and the United States the "axis of evil," a phrase used by President Bush in his 2002 inaugural address to describe Iraq, Iran and North Korea. Signs also described Hezbollah and Hamas as the "axis of justice."
Malaysia is an overwhelmingly Muslim country, but also a moderate nation that the United States has held up as a model for the future of the Islamic world.
Finer reported from Israel. Fred Barbash reported from Washington.
© 2006 The Washington Post Company