Clinton to visit Israel, West Bank

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Hillary Clinton will make her first visit to Israel and the occupied West Bank as U.S. secretary of state next week, Israeli officials said on Monday.

Her visit will maintain efforts to revive peacemaking between Israel and the Palestinians despite political uncertainty on both sides.

Clinton was scheduled to hold meetings on March 3 and 4 with outgoing Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, along with other leaders, after she attends a March 2 conference in Egypt on reconstruction in the Gaza Strip following last month's war, the officials said.

U.S. officials had no immediate comment on the visit, which comes despite political uncertainty in Israel over the make-up and policies of the next government.

A separate visit to Israel and the West Bank by George Mitchell, U.S. President Barack Obama's Middle East envoy, will begin on Thursday. Mitchell will return there with Clinton after they attend the Gaza conference at the Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh, Israeli officials said.

Right-wing parties gained ground in Israel's February 10 parliamentary election, denting U.S. hopes for an Israeli coalition that can move toward peace with the Palestinians and other Arab neighbors after the fighting in Gaza, which is ruled by the Hamas Islamist group.

In addition to Olmert, Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni and Defense Minister Ehud Barak, Clinton was expected to meet right-winger Benjamin Netanyahu, whom Israeli President Shimon Peres has asked to form the next government.

Netanyahu, head of the Likud party, has asked Livni, the centrist Kadima leader who led unsuccessful peace talks with the Palestinians last year, to join him in a broad coalition government, but she has so far refused.

COALITION OUTLOOK

That may leave Netanyahu little choice but to form a narrow coalition with other right-wing parties which oppose the kind of concessions demanded by Palestinians in the peace talks. That could in turn raise tensions with the Obama administration.

Israeli and Western officials said the Obama administration wanted the next Israeli government to resume peace talks with Abbas and to clamp down on Jewish settlement building in the West Bank and ease travel restrictions for Palestinians there.

But it is unclear to what extent Netanyahu will go along with this. He has ruled out a settlement freeze, and has said he wants to shift the focus of stalled peace talks with the Palestinians to shoring up their economy and away from tough territorial issues.

Senior Abbas aide Saeb Erekat said the Palestinians were looking to Clinton to keep the pressure on Israel to meet its international commitments.

"The most important thing for us is to see to that any Israeli government that is formed is committed to a two-state solution and to stopping settlement expansion," Erekat said.

But Clinton also faces formidable political challenges on the Palestinian side, which is divided between Abbas in the West Bank and Hamas in Gaza.

The United States backs Abbas and his prime minister, Salam Fayyad. It boycotts Hamas, which seized control of Gaza in 2007 and refuses to recognize Israel or renounce violence.

(Reporting by Adam Entous; Editing by Louise Ireland and Alastair Macdonald)