Rice seen holding steady on US Middle East policy

Israeli officials said on Tuesday they expected no major change in Washington's strong support for Israel after a main architect of the policy, Condoleezza Rice, takes over as secretary of state. Palestinians said they hoped Rice, US President George W. Bush's national security adviser, would pursue more vigorously a violence-stalled peace "road map", charting negotiations with Israel leading to the creation of a Palestinian state.
Bush, seen as the most pro-Israel US president ever and a supporter of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's unilateral Gaza pullout plan, was expected to nominate Rice on Tuesday to replace Colin Powell, who announced his resignation on Monday.
"For us it does not make much of a change," a senior Israeli official said about Rice's appointment.
"We have a friend in the White House, and this is important. The strategic ties between Israel and the United States have never been stronger."
As national security adviser in Bush's administration, Rice has spearheaded US dealings with Sharon since he became prime minister in 2001, holding frequent meetings with his chief adviser, Dov Weisglass.
Rice has been a vocal advocate of a policy that adopted Sharon's refusal to deal with the late Palestinian president, Yasser Arafat, and demanded a new Palestinian leadership "not compromised by terror".
"She's a very sharp player," one Israeli official said. "When she wants to be firm, she can be firm. When she wants to be tough, she can be tough."
With the Middle East landscape changed by the death of Arafat, Nabil Abu Rdainah, a senior aide to the late leader and now adviser to caretaker President Rawhi Fattouh, urged Rice to speed up implementation of the road map.
"We hope the American administration will resume its direct contacts with the Palestinian Authority and not waste time," Abu Rdainah said. Rice brought a glint to Sharon's eye from the start.
"I must confess, it was hard for me to concentrate in the conversation with Condoleezza Rice because she has very nice legs," Sharon was widely quoted as saying several years ago about his first meeting, in 2000, with then-presidential candidate Bush's foreign policy adviser.