US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice won yesterday a Saudi pledge of support for a US-backed Middle East peace conference and began a visit to Israel and the West Bank with a call to seize new opportunities.

In talks in the region, Rice has been trying to inject new momentum into peacemaking between Israel and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' West Bank government after the violent takeover of the Gaza Strip by Hamas Islamists in June.

"Israel is not going to miss this opportunity, we are not going to miss the opportunity to promote a dialogue with Mahmoud Abbas and the Palestinian government," said Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, with Rice at her side.

Livni said it was important to put "significant" issues on the table with the Palestinians but indicated the Israeli government was not yet ready to accept Abbas' proposal to negotiate so-called final-status matters.

"Sometimes it is not wise to put the most sensitive issues first," she said when asked whether Israel was prepared to look at the most difficult issues such as future borders with a Palestinian state, Jerusalem and refugees.

Riyad al-Malki, the Palestinian information minister, said in the West Bank city of Ramallah the Palestinian government would ask Rice "to put pressure on the Israeli side to respond to our security needs".

Malki defined those needs as a withdrawal of Israeli forces from positions around major West Bank cities and an expanded Israeli amnesty for wanted Palestinians.

Rice said she aimed in her visits to Jerusalem and to Ramallah today, where she will meet Abbas, to take advantage of "mutual opportunities" to advance a two-state solution between the Israelis and the Palestinians.

"This is a time to seize opportunities and it is a time to proceed in a prepared and careful way as one does not want to miss opportunities because of a lack of preparation but it is nonetheless a time when we have to take advantage of what is before us," said Rice.

Rice flew to Israel from Saudi Arabia, where Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal said Riyadh welcomed US President George W. Bush's initiative to hold a Middle East peace conference later this year. No date or venue has been set.

"There is an international movement (for peace) ... Israel should respond to these pressures," Prince Saud said, without promising that Saudi Arabia would attend the conference.

(China Daily via agencies August 2, 2007)