IYADH, Saudi Arabia, Nov. 18 Saudi Arabia's foreign minister urged the United States this weekend to give peace a chance in Iraq and focus instead on settling the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
The foreign minister, Prince Saud al-Faisal, interviewed at his office in the Foreign Ministry building here, said the Bush administration's obsession with Iraq "has diverted attention from many crucial issues in the Middle East, particularly the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and the need for this region to move again toward economic development."
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Saudi Arabia, a potentially vital ally in prosecuting any war against Iraq, has remained officially opposed to American action against Saddam Hussein despite endorsing the recent United Nations resolution sending weapons inspectors back to Iraq after a four-year hiatus.
While Saudi Arabia may ultimately back American action, many people here question the Bush administration's motives in pushing for Mr. Hussein's ouster while devoting far less attention to the Israeli-Palestinian problem.
Prince Saud said he was disturbed by premature talk of catching Iraq in a "material breach" of the United Nations resolution, which would give the United States political cover for a military attack.
"We are hopeful that Iraq accepted the resolution to implement it, not to break it," he said. "Therefore we have every expectation that they will follow through without any breach, material or otherwise."
Prince Saud did not shed any light on whether Saudi Arabia would allow the United States to use Saudi military bases for any attack on Iraq, insisting that Washington had not yet asked for such assistance.
The prince reiterated his earlier statement that even if the United Nations does pass a resolution authorizing military action against Iraq, no country is obligated to take part in any conflict.
"That's a sovereign decision," he said, "and I'm not going to speculate on how we're going to decide."
The United States, in preparing for a possible strike against Iraq, has begun looking for alternatives to the Saudi bases it used during the Persian Gulf war in 1991 and where it has maintained a military presence.
In particular, the United States has helped expand Al Udeid Air Base in the adjacent emirate of Qatar as a possible replacement for the American command and control headquarters at Prince Sultan Air Base near Riyadh. Next month, Gen. Tommy R. Franks will direct exercises at Al Udeid with 600 officers from the military's Central Command in Florida in what analysts say is a dry run for using the base as the command post for an invasion of Iraq.
Shifting the United States' primary base of operations to Qatar would relieve pressure on the Saudi royal family from the country's powerful religious clerics and their conservative constituency, who oppose the presence of American military forces in same country as Islam's two holiest cities, Mecca and Medina.
But such a shift would also be a blow to Saudi Arabia's prestige and represent a concrete deterioration in Saudi-American relations, which have been strained since 15 Saudis took part in the terrorist attacks in the United States on Sept. 11. Many Americans blame Saudi Arabia's conservative brand of state-sanctioned Islam for breeding militancy, a charge that most Saudis reject.
Prince Saud said any decision to shift American military headquarters "depends completely on the United States."
But he urged Washington not to let Iraq divert efforts from the most pressing problem in the region, the worsening Israeli-Palestinian conflict, which Muslims across the region regard as the driving force behind the rising tide of militant Islamic terrorism in the world.
"The Iraq situation is a distraction," Prince Saud said, because for peace to come about between Israel and the Palestinians, "there has to be a very clear and forthright position by the United States."
He expressed frustration at Washington's failure to press Israel into acting on the latest "road map" to peace proffered by the so-called Quartet the United States, the European Union, Russia and the United Nations. This group has been trying to secure Israeli and Palestinian agreement on a three-year plan leading to Palestinian statehood.
Earlier this year, Saudi Arabia played a crucial role in drawing that map by securing Arab League promises of peace and recognition for Israel in return for Israel's withdrawal from occupied territories and the creation of a Palestinian state.
Prince Saud called on the United States to provide help to the region.
"Regardless of the road map or all the other issues, let's solve the human problems of these people," he said. "Allow people who work in the field of human distribution of food and medical hospitals to be established in different parts of the occupied territory and prevent the continuous attack by Israel on the Palestinians that don't allow these things to happen."