The Mideast peace process faced a possible setback on Wednesday when Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon gave Foreign Minister Peres a “limited mandate” for his upcoming meeting with Palestinian President Yasser Arafat.
Amid reports that the Middle East peace process was back on track with the announced meeting, Sharon explained to US Ambassador to Israel Daniel Kurtzer in a meeting Tuesday that Peres was to discuss with Arafat only two issues: easing restrictions on Palestinians "not involved in terrorism," and conditions for a ceasefire.
Arafat and Peres are to meet next week, reportedly in Berlin, hosted by German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer who is touring the region.
During his meeting with the US envoy, Sharon repeated his stance that Arafat was not doing anything to stop Palestinian attacks on Israel and that "Arafat must start dealing with terrorism."
Sharon also told Kurtzer that Palestinian shooting at Israeli soldiers and citizens continued in the area of Bethlehem even after shooting at the Gilo Jewish settlement from Beit Jala had stopped, said the paper.
A statement by Sharon’s office was quoted by Haaretz as saying that Sharon "did not relinquish even one minute of the seven days of complete quiet, which must prevail before any advance to the Mitchell report."
Following a second meeting with Fischer in Ramallah, Arafat reiterated that any solution should be based on the full implementation of the Mitchell recommendations.
The previously unannounced meeting followed talks between Fischer and Sharon.
The German FM later returned to Ramallah to once again meet with Arafat and Palestinian Information Minister Yasser Abed Rabbo. Palestinian sources were quoted by the paper as saying that Fischer had new information from Sharon to relay to Arafat.
"I welcome your [Fischer's] good ideas and I welcome meeting...Shimon Peres in your office in Berlin as you suggested," Arafat told reporters.
Asked when the meeting could take place, Arafat said, "At any moment."
According to AFP, Peres said in Budapest he was ready to meet Arafat "very soon."
"I intend to see him very soon," said Peres, who met Fischer late Monday. "I feel that with words we can achieve much more than with weapons."
However, Peres said the venue would be decided after he returned to Israel, and the Palestinian leader came back from a scheduled trip to China, due to begin on Thursday.
Winding up a two-day public debate in the Security Council on the Middle East crisis, the Israeli ambassador, Yehuda Lancry, said the meeting "might suggest... a new departure," as quoted by AFP.
Lancry said the planned meeting represented Israel's preference for direct, bilateral talks with the Palestinians, as opposed to intervention by the United Nations.
He described a Palestinian-inspired draft resolution circulated to members of the Security Council before the debate as "totally impractical, in spite of its sophisticated content."
The Palestinian observer to the UN, Nasser Al Kidwa, replied that the Palestinians had "never been opposed to serious dialogue."
But the Peres-Arafat meeting "comes with all conditions dictated by the (Israeli) prime minister (Ariel Sharon), including not to seriously discuss political questions, but to stick to issues related to the security situation," Kidwa said.
"Quite frankly, we don't believe in this context that this will change anything," he told the agency.
"We will try, as we have tried before, with this tiresome business, but there needs to be a real change in the Israeli position."
The United States again raised objections to the deployment of international observers in the occupied Palestinian territories during the special UN Security Council debate on the Middle East.
Meanwhile, Arab foreign ministers were preparing for a meeting in Cairo on Wednesday aimed at unifying Arab support for the Palestinian uprising.
But the United States endorsed the holding of talks between Arafat and Peres. "Whatever methodology that works for the two sides we will support," deputy State Department spokesman Philip Reeker said Tuesday.
"We support direct contacts between the parties and will support both sides in any efforts they want to make as much as possible. The Germans are trusted friends," Haaretz quoted him as saying.
Reeker stressed the US interest was in dialogue between the two sides, and efforts by any government to arrange security talks were welcome.
Meanwhile, Edward S. Walker, a former US ambassador to Israel, called on the Bush administration to make clear its opposition to Israeli assassinations of Palestinian militant activists.
"If we don't, it undermines our position as an intermediary and negotiator," Walker told the Associated Press in an interview.
However, the retired diplomat, who is now president of the Middle East Institute, said it was "not up to the United States to tell Israel yea or nay on something as critical as this, with the terrorism going on."
Walker said, "Assassinating terrorists does not work. It makes the terrorist a hero, especially to young people, and does not strike at those responsible for the attacks on Israel." He added that he hoped Israel would find another way of dealing with the problem.
Reeker, meanwhile, reiterated that the Bush administration was opposed to Israel's assassination of suspected Palestinian resistance fighters. He said the US government's opposition to the policy and practice of targeted killings had long been made clear and that they would continue to urge Israel to desist from this policy.
Palestinian officials say that over 40 political leaders and resistance fighters have been killed under Israel's assassination policy, variously called by the euphemisms "targeted killings," "liquidations," "surgical strikes," and "interception operations."
AFP's latest death tally for the Palestinian uprising against 34 years of Israeli military occupation comes out to 13 Arab Israelis, 563 Palestinians, and 146 Israelis, putting the ratio of casualties at around four Palestinians killed for every Israeli loss.
Israel’s wounded number in the high hundreds, according to army sources, while the Palestine Red Crescent Society puts the number of Palestinians injured at over 14,000.
Amnesty International reported early this year that almost 100 Palestinian children had been killed by Israeli soldiers, nearly all in situations where the occupation troops were under no immediate threat.
The latest Palestinian uprising against 34 years of Israeli military occupation began last September – Albawaba.com
© 2001 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
