The US's lopsided approach to the Palestinian conflict

When the US President George Bush, apparently in anguish, bluntly asked Israel to withdraw its forces from the Palestinian areas without any delay and announced in an emergency press conference to dispatch Colin Powell to the region in a bid to find ways and means essential for quelling the ongoing macabre violence, many sensed a positive change in the US attitude towards the Palestinian conflict, believing that Powell's visit would bring a cease-fire and might help scoop up the region from the bloody morass it finds itself in.

But such hopes soon evaporated following the meeting of Powell with Ariel Sharon that ended without an agreement on the withdrawal of Israeli forces from the Palestinian area.

No doubt, Powell's statements regarding the conflict sounded somewhat logical.

He issued a statement calling on Israeli forces in the West Bank to exercise the utmost restraint and discipline and refrain from the excessive use of force, repeating declarations of his support for a Palestinian state and advising Israel that hunting down terrorists would not provide security without seeking a political approach to the conflict.

But faced with yet another defiance by the Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and a suicide attack by a Palestinian woman, his somewhat rational posture turned as hawkish as to match the views possessed by the fanatic hawks of the Bush administration.