"I think the timetable of 2005 isn't as realistic as it was two years ago," said Bush

CAIRO, May 8 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) – U.S. President George W. Bush backtracked in an interview published Saturday, May 8, on the 2005 date, he set two years ago, for the establishment of a Palestinian state, pleasing the Israelis and riling the Palestinians.

"Well, 2005 may be hard, since 2005 is right around the corner," Bush told Egypt ’s leading daily, Al-Ahram.

"I think the timetable of 2005 isn't as realistic as it was two years ago," said Bush, contradicting his own vision on two Palestinian and Israeli states living side by side in peace by 2005, reported Agence France-Presse (AFP).

The latest blow to the peace process came only weeks after Bush broke away with decades of American foreign policy and gave Israeli Premier Ariel Sharon a letter of guarantees, better known in the Arab world now as the "Bushfour".

Bush assured Sharon Washington would never force  Israel to withdraw from the entire  West Bank (internationally-recognized occupied Palestinian territory) under any future peace settlement and denied the right of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes from which they were booted out in 1948.

The Palestinians reacted angrily to Bush's public dropping of the 2005 target date for their promised state.

Palestinian President Yasser Arafat said it was "unrealistic" to delay statehood for his people beyond the internationally agreed 2005 target date.

His Premier Ahmed Qorei agreed, insisting there was still enough time till 2005, reported the Israeli daily Ha'aretz.

"I think that we have plenty of time from this moment until the end of 2005...to seriously negotiate...to work towards a comprehensive and permanent agreement.

"If we are delayed, that means that we are giving in to the desire of the Israeli government to stretch out the negotiations and drag them out, for another 10 or 15 years as I have heard many times in the Israeli press. By then, no one will have the ability to take control of the situation".

Commenting on Bush’s statements, Qorei hoped "this is not final," adding that the remarks were "a contradiction to what President Bush declared."

Palestinian Negotiations Minister Saeb Erakat, also weighed in, accusing Bush of effectively torpedoing the peace plan drawn up by the European Union,  Russia and the United Nations as well as the   United States, and published amid great fanfare last June.

"I think that we have plenty of time from this moment until the end of 2005," said Qorei

"President Bush's position removes any substance from the roadmap by calling into question the timetable for its implementation, which is an essential element of it," Erakat told AFP.

"In this way, Bush is meeting the demands of Ariel Sharon.  Sharon  and  Israel have always violated the rules of the game and obtained the backing of the Americans."

For its part,  Israel  welcomed Bush’s comments, going even further by ruling out any possibility of Palestinian statehood next year.

"The target date of 2005 has become an impossibility because we are still at the starting point of the roadmap as a result of the Palestinian Authority's refusal to combat terrorism," claimed Sharon's foreign policy advisor, Salman Shoval.

"Under these conditions, it's clear that the 2005 target date is no longer at all realistic."

On Thursday, May 6, Bush was directly rebuked when the U.N. General Assembly overwhelmingly affirmed the Palestinians’ right to sovereignty over their lands