WASHINGTON, May 5: President George Bush said on Thursday that the United States had an ‘unshakeable’ commitment to defend Israel and pledged that his administration would have no contact with the militant Palestinian group Hamas as long as it refuses to recognise the Jewish state.

“America’s commitment to Israel’s security is strong, enduring and unshakeable,” Mr Bush said in a speech in Washington to the influential American Jewish Committee (AJC), which is marking its 100th anniversary.

He said the United States and Israel were ‘natural allies and these ties will never be broken’.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who also addressed the gala event along with UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, evoked the horrors of the Holocaust and vowed that her country would not waver in its support for Israel.

“The right of existence of the state of Israel must never be questioned,” Ms Merkel, who was the first German chancellor to address the AJC, said to loud applause by the audience of some 2,500 Jewish leaders, US politicians and diplomats.

“This is why it is intolerable for any German government when the Iranian president questions the right of Israel’s existence.”

She was referring to repeated anti-Israel comments by Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. In October he said that the Jewish state should be ‘wiped off the map’.

Mr Bush said the United States was ‘concerned because the Iranian regime is repressing its people, sponsoring terrorists, destabilising the region, threatening Israel and defying the world with its ambitions for nuclear weapons’.

“America will continue to rally the world to confront these threats,” he said.

Ms Merkel said the standoff with Iran over its nuclear program was of great concern and added that it was essential for the international community to be united on the issue.

“Iran must be prevented from getting nuclear weapons,” she said. “We need to stand together and show a united front.”

Both Merkel and Bush also urged Hamas to choose the path of peace by recognising Israel and thus offering a better future for the Palestinian people.

“Hamas has made it clear that they do not acknowledge the right of Israel to exist, and I’ve made it clear that so long as that’s their policy, we will have no contact with the leaders of Hamas,” Mr Bush said.

Ms Merkel said it was up to the militant group to “reject violence and acknowledge without ambiguity Israel’s right to exist”.

Mr Annan said that despite enormous obstacles to peace between Israel and the Palestinians, he remained hopeful.

“I refuse to despair,” he said. “There is still abundant evidence that peace is what the majority of both Israelis and Palestinians want, even if each is reluctant to believe that the other wants it too.” —AFP