WASHINGTON,
September 10, 2005 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) – While the
US managed to secure a Saudi pledge to ease boycott of Israel in swap
for helping the kingdom join the World Trade Organization (WTO), the
main Jewish lobby in America said the move did not live up to its
expectations.
Riyadh
has promised, as part of a bilateral agreement signed with Washington
on Friday, September 9, not to enforce aspects of the Arab League
boycott of Israel that apply to US firms doing business with Israel,
US Trade Representative Rob Portman said in a statement posted on his
Web site.
The
kingdom has also pledged to abide by WTO rules in its trade with all
148 members of the WTO, including Israel, he added.
"As
a result of negotiations on its accession to the WTO, we will see
greater openness, further development of the rule of law, and
political and economic reform in Saudi Arabia".
The
agreement, signed without public fanfare in Washington, paves the way
for Saudi Arabia to join the WTO by the end of 2005.
The
United States was the last WTO member to reach a bilateral market
access deal with Riyadh.
Saudi
Arabia is one of the four largest world economies outside the WTO and
is the only Gulf country that is not member of the world organization.
AIPAC
Dissatisfied
The
American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), an influential
pro-Israel group, criticized the pact, saying it fails to end Riyadh's
direct boycott of Israel, reported Reuters.
"The
United States should not be extending trade preferences to countries
that are undermining our policies in the Middle East and contravene
the basic principles of the World Trade Organization," said Josh
Block, a spokesman for AIPAC.
But
Mary Irace, vice president of the National Foreign Trade Council,
which represents U.S. multinational companies, defended the agreement
as addressing the boycott issue in "a very serious and
constructive manner."
Earlier
this year, a bipartisan group of 47 lawmakers in the US House of
Representatives urged the Bush administration not to sign a WTO
accession deal with Riyadh until it made progress on the boycott
issue.
Arab
states once boycotted not just Israeli firms themselves, but
third-country companies which do business with Israel.
However,
the indirect boycott has largely lapsed since the launch of the Middle
East peace process in 1991.
Washington,
Israel's main alley, has been credited with fruitful efforts to help
Tel Aviv forge diplomatic ties with many Arab and Muslim countries
that had in the past linked such a move to the establishment of an
independent Palestinian state with occupied Al-Quds (East Jerusalem)
as its capital.
On
Thursday, September 1, 2005, Israeli Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom
met in Istanbul with his Pakistani counterpart Khurshid Kasuri, the
first official high-level contact between both countries.
They
agreed that the Israeli interest section would be located at the
Turkish embassy in Islamabad and would work on cementing cultural and
trade ties, as a start.
Pakistani
President Pervez Musharraf is a key alley in Washington's so-called
war on terrorism.
Diplomatic
sources have also said that Israel was planning to establish
diplomatic ties with Indonesia, the largest Muslim-populated state,
and Malaysia, seen as the Muslim world's economic giant.
