President Barack Obama's national security advisor James Jones will head to the Middle East this week, as the administration opens a fresh bid to revive Israeli-Palestinian peace talks.
Jones will meet key leaders of Saudi Arabia, Israel and the Palestinian territories to discuss the "full range of regional challenges and opportunities at this critical time," his spokesman Mike Hammer said.
The mission coincides with an effort by US Middle East peace envoy George Mitchell to rally Europe behind the new American efforts to work towards a two-state peace deal.
News that makes sense
Your trusted source for staying up-to-date with the world around you. Get free daily news updates and analysis, straight to your inbox.
"We are working with the parties to resume negotiations as soon as possible with a set timetable for their successful conclusion," Mitchell told reporters after meeting French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner in Paris.
The Obama administration meanwhile sought to ease Israeli fears, denying financial pressure would be used to force Israel to halt its settlement building.
"Just to clarify this, he wasn't signaling any you know, particular course of action," State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said.
Mitchell "was simply asked a question with an historical context, you know, 'Are there sticks that -- that are available?' And I think he mentioned that this is a step that the United States has taken in the past.
"He wasn't signaling that this is something that we're forecasting in the future, you know, but it obviously is something that we have in our toolbox."
In early 1990 Washington put up 10 billion dollars of bank guarantees to help Israel welcome hundreds of thousands of immigrants from the former Soviet bloc. The money was temporarily frozen at the end of 1991, and then reduced in November 2003.
An EU spokesman in Brussels meanwhile said Mitchell and other special representatives of the Middle East diplomatic "Quartet" will meet in Brussels on Wednesday to discuss the new US plan to restart peace talks.
Obama made Middle East peace moves a priority after taking office last year, but has had little success with Israel defying calls for a settlement freeze and Arab nations refusing to make concessions to the Jewish state.
Crowley said Mitchell hoped to "push the parties and all who are supporting this process to get the negotiation restarted as quickly as possible."
