Rice: Bush had no warning on Rantisi strike
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The United States did not know Israel was going to kill Hamas leader Abdel Aziz Rantisi, national security adviser Condoleezza Rice said Sunday.
Speaking to ABC's "This Week," Rice said President Bush "doesn't discuss with [Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon] Israeli operations."
"We have said repeatedly to the Israelis that, while we understand and support Israel's right to defend itself, that it's extremely important that Israel take into consideration the consequences of anything that it does."
An Israeli helicopter launched the strike on Rantisi's car Saturday, killing him and two bodyguards. (Full story)
Bush last week endorsed Sharon's plan for unilateral Israeli disengagement from Gaza. Under the plan, Israeli military and settlers would pull out of Gaza, while Israel would keep certain settlements in the West Bank and potentially expand them. Bush's endorsement sparked anger from many Palestinians and other Arab leaders.
Rice insisted Bush's endorsement of the plan does not automatically mean that the removal of the West Bank settlements will never be up for discussion.
"No one is taking anything off the table," she insisted, saying final arrangements will be up to the two sides."
Jewish settlements in Palestinian territories is an issue contained in the so-called "road map" to Mideast peace, backed by the United States, Russia, the European Union and the United Nations. It calls for steps on both sides aimed at ending the conflict and establishing an independent Palestinian state by 2005.
While Rantisi was leader of a group that the United States considers a terrorist organization for numerous attacks against civilians, Rice acknowledged that the timing of his killing -- just days after Sharon's visit to Washington and news about the disengagement plan -- was "not helpful."
"We understand that the Israelis have to defend themselves," Rice said. "It's just extremely important that the Israelis also keep in mind the long view here."
Bush 'partially responsible' for violence
But Palestinian Labor Minister Ghassan Khatib told CNN's "Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer" that the Bush administration's support for the Sharon administration takes away from the peace process -- and that Bush is "partially responsible" for the cycle of violence in the region.
Even if he was unaware of plans to kill Rantisi, "the nature of the unjustified, irrational kind of support that President Bush has given to Prime Minister Sharon, especially this support on issues that contradict with the international law, is responsible for encouraging ... Sharon to proceed with the kind of illegal activities and to proceed with the use of force ... and all the kind of assassinations that we have been witnessing," Khatib said.
"This makes George Bush also partially responsible for all the kind of continuity of violence and other aspects of violating the human rights of the Palestinians that this Israeli government is proceeding with," he said.
Ehud Olmert, Israel's vice prime minister, said Bush and Sharon share a common bond as leaders of the war on terrorism.
"These two leaders are determined to carry on this fight against terror, not by making statements, not by words, not by empty gestures, but by actual fighting against those who are creating the terror as such a fundamental threat to the ways of life of our countries," Olmert said.
Bush had no warning about Israel's attack on Rantisi, Olmert said.
Asked whether he is concerned about retaliation, Olmert said he does not believe the killing of Rantisi, or of Sheikh Ahmed Yassin -- the Hamas founder killed by Israel last month -- acts as "any meaningful trigger."
Palestinian militants "started this terror, they have made the use of human bombs, those suicidal attackers, as frequent as possible," Olmert said. "They've been doing it 300 times already. ... We expect it to happen every day."
