US welcomes Israel's initiatives to release detainees

The US has welcomed Israel's approval to release hundreds of Palestinian detainees at a time this subject and others raised Israeli- Palestinian differences resulted in foiling a preliminary meeting between the two sides for the Sharm al-Sheikh summit set for next week.

The assistant for the spokesman for the US Department Of State Adam Early said that "measures as such are important and worthy to be commended" because it helps to keep the argument between the two sides, recalling that the US secretary of state Condoleezza Rice will discuss these issue during her next visit to Israel and the Palestinian territories next Sunday and Monday.

For her part, Rice called on Thursday in London the Arab states and others to resume providing financial aids in order to finance what is called the Palestinian reforms.

This call came after the US President George W. Bush vowed in the speech on Thursday to provide aids for the Palestinians at $ 350 million.

Rice recommended the summit which will be held on Tuesday between the Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon and the chairman of the Palestinian Authority Mahmoud Abbas with the participation of the Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and the Jordanian king Abdullah II.

She added that the summit which was summoned by Mubarak "is a very important step in what constitutes now a series of steps that can give dynamism and momentum to the Israeli- Palestinian case and the efforts made for returning back to the Roadmap peace plan.

In a message to senior legislators in the Congress, the US Agency for International Development said that this sum "reflects the interest of the American government to providing a tangible progress to the Palestinian leadership recently elected and to the Palestinian people through the rapid and tangible program.