WASHINGTON, Aug 25: In the wake of more deadly Israeli-Palestinian violence, key US lawmakers called on Sunday for outside military forces to help secure the fading chance for peace — something Palestinians have sought and Israel insists is unnecessary.

“If we’re serious about having a situation of stability, a very direct action, I think, is going to be required,” Senator Richard Lugar of Indiana told CNN.

Lugar, Republican chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said Washington should consider the possibility that US and other nations’ troops would be needed to provide stability for Israelis and Palestinians in the wake of deadly violence that threatened US-backed peace efforts.

“We ought to involve our NATO allies. We ought to involve others in the Middle East. In other words, we need to think through this carefully. But still, the terrorists have to be routed out because they will ruin any possibility for peace in that area,” he said.

A leading Democrat agreed.

“I hope we’re not there, but we may well be. The Palestinians have wanted a United Nations or an American observer force,” Senator Dianne Feinstein of California told CNN.

“I mean, it’s clear to me you can’t have just a straight observer force. But you have to have some military entity that is going to be able to control the terror. Otherwise, the situation is going to dissolve into nothingness.”

Lugar is the most prominent of several US lawmakers pushing for a third-party military force to help dampen the cycle of Palestinian attacks and Israeli retaliation that continually threaten the US-backed “roadmap” for peace.

Palestinians have for years sought international peacekeepers to protect them from Israel, but the Jewish state, backed by the administration of US President George W. Bush, rejects the idea, making it unlikely to occur in the foreseeable future.

Still, Washington needs to do more to support Palestinian efforts to rein in militants and protect Israelis from terrorist attacks, said Representative Howard Ford of Tennessee.

“If America is as committed as I believe we are, and as dedicated as our actions suggest at times ... then we’re going to have to support the Palestinians, and support particularly Prime Minister (Mahmud) Abbas in more meaningful and bigger ways than we have up to this point,” Ford, who recently returned from a trip to the Middle East, told the “Fox News Sunday” program.

The most recent calls for US military involvement came after deadly violence shattered a seven-week-old truce and put peace efforts on hold.—AFP