U.S. should deal with Hamas, say ex-officials

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Eight retired senior U.S. officials and lawmakers urged the United States and its allies on Wednesday to begin a "genuine dialogue" with Hamas Islamists ahead of a U.S.-hosted Middle East peace conference.

In a letter to President George W. Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, the dignitaries also urged the Bush administration to focus on the "end game" between the Israelis and the Palestinians at the conference, expected to take place in late November in Annapolis, Maryland.

United States policy is to isolate Hamas, which seized the Gaza Strip in June and has refused to formally abandon its goal of destroying Israel.

Washington says it will not invite the group, which it defines as a "terrorist organization," to the conference and has put its full support behind Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and his Fatah faction.

"We believe that a genuine dialogue with the organization is far preferable to its isolation," said the letter signed by both Democrats and Republicans.

The signatories were: former national security advisors Zbigniew Brzezinski and Brent Scowcroft; former U.S. trade representative Carla Hills; former Republican Sen. Nancy Kassebaum-Baker; former Fed chairman Paul Volcker, former U.N. ambassador Thomas Pickering; former Democratic Rep. Lee Hamilton who is co-chair of the Iraq Study Group and Theodore Sorensen, an adviser to President John F. Kennedy.

Brzezinski, who was President Jimmy Carter's adviser, said isolating Hamas did not help the peace process and suggested the quartet of Middle East peace brokers could open a dialogue with Hamas. The quartet comprises the United States, the European Union, the United Nations and Russia.

"We have no illusions that the dialogue will be easy, but we also know that Hamas has people in it who are realistic and know that a permanent state of war and conflict is not going to be conducive to a better future for the Palestinians," he told reporters in a conference call.

The letter also urged the United States to press for peace talks between Israel and Syria under international auspices. Kassebaum-Baker praised the administration for signaling it would invite Syria to the meeting. "This should be followed by genuine engagement," she said.

State Department spokesman Sean McCormack declined comment on the letter, which came days before Rice visits Israel and the Palestinian Territories to prepare for the conference.

"She's going to have her sleeves rolled up," he said.

The Israelis and the Palestinians are working on a joint document that will form the basis for formal Palestinian statehood negotiations expected to begin after the conference.

The letter said if the Israelis and the Palestinians could not reach agreement, the quartet should put forward its own outline deal which would include two states with Jerusalem as home to two capitals; a solution to the refugee problem and security mechanisms that addressed both Israeli concerns while respecting Palestinian sovereignty.

For the conference to have any credibility, the former officials said it must coincide with a freeze in Israeli settlement expansion.

McCormack declined to be drawn on the issue. "At this point, I don't see the two parties talking in public about what they are discussing and I'm not going to do it for them," he said.