This Week

Talk Amid The Fire

Israeli-Palestinian talks continue amid terrorist attacks.

DAVID LANDAU
Jewish Telegraphic Agency

Jerusalem

T

here was a flurry of Israeli-Palestinian
diplomacy this week despite Israeli Prime
Minister Ariel Sharon's repeated
announcement that there would be "no
talks under fire." Amid numerous meetings between
Israeli and Palestinian officials at various levels were
reports that Israel is ready to consider a proposal for
reviving Israeli-Palestinian negotiations.
The diplomatic feelers, however, alternated with
several terror attacks.
On Saturday, Israeli and Palestinian officials met
for four hours and agreed to resume limited security
cooperation.
A day later, a Palestinian suicide bomber killed a
53-year-old doctor and wounded at least 50 other
Israelis when he detonated explosives strapped to his
body at a crowded bus stop in Kfar Saba, a Tel Aviv
suburb near the border with the West Bank.
On Monday, at least eight Israelis were wounded
when a car bomb exploded in Or Yehuda, another
Tel Aviv suburb. A brother, 12, and sister, 8, were
among the wounded.
Just the same, in a possible indication of the two
sides' determination to continue talking, Israel and
the Palestinian Authority held another round of
U.S.-sponsored security talks Monday night.
The two sides agreed to "make an effort to lower
the level of violence and improve security coordina-
tion," according to an Israeli statement.
The change in tone was reflected Monday in the
Israeli daily Hdaretz, which said Sharon regards a
Jordanian-Egyptian initiative to end the violence and
resume Israeli-Palestinian negotiations as "an impor-
tant point of departure." That was a far cry from
Sharon's previous dismissal of the initiative as
unworthy of serious consideration.
Sharon told the Jerusalem Post that he wants some
"changes and improvements" in the Arab plan.
He also said he plans to send Foreign Minister
Shimon Peres to Egypt to discuss the proposal before
Peres goes to Washington next week.
Israeli officials stress that the original proposal
submitted by Cairo and Amman has been amended
to accommodate Israeli reservations. The proposal
now does not impose any preconditions on either
Israel or the Palestinians, the officials said.

Terms Of Agreement

The initiative calls for the two sides to implement a
disengagement and security accord reached last

4/27
2001

20

that Israel end a military incursion into the Gaza
Strip intended to root out Palestinian mortar squads
continues to resonate in the region.
Powell called the Israeli response to Palestinian
violence "excessive and disproportionate." Saying
there could be no military solution to the ongoing
crisis, he urged the two sides to return to diplomacy.
Israel's political and military establishments are still
arguing over whether Powell's rebuke prompted the
Israel Defense Force's withdrawal from the square mile
of Gaza it had occupied less than 24 hours before—
or whether Sharon and Defense Minister Benjamin
Ben-Eliezer already had decided to pull back.
But there is no argument that Powell's words repre-
sented a departure for the Bush administration, which
previously had signaled that it would be less involved
in Middle East policy than was President Bill Clinton
With broader regional interests in mind, the Bush
administration wants to show the Arab world that it
is committed to ending the violence and putting
peace talks back on track. That is now being made
clear to Israel.
Europe, meanwhile, is displaying growing impa-
tience with the deteriorating situation in the
Mideast. France reportedly is preparing a proposal
for the European Union to threaten Israel with eco-
nomic sanctions.
While the "old Sharon" was considered impervious
to international opinion, as prime minister, Sharon
is proving anxious to avoid gratuitous tensions with
key international players.

,

.

Policy Vs. Reality

Israeli Prime Minster
Ariel Sharon is working
with an Arab plan.

October in Sharm El-Sheik, Egypt. Among its clauses:
• Israel would withdraw troops to the positions
held before Palestinian violence erupted last
September, lifting its blockades of Palestinian cities.
• The Palestinian Authority would stop inciting
violence and would clamp down on militant groups.
• Security cooperation would resume, and eventu-
ally the diplomatic dialogue would resume as well.
• The two sides would not be required to resume
peace negotiations from the point reached under for-
mer Prime Minister Ehud Barak, an earlier
Palestinian demand that Sharon continues to reject.
While the terms of the Egyptian-Jordanian initia-
tive have become more palatable to Israel, they
nonetheless require Sharon to abandon his condition
that Palestinian violence cease completely before
negotiations can resume.
Political observers say Sharon's apparent shift is the
result of pressure from the United States and the
international community.
The vigorous public intervention last week by
U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell, who demanded

Political observers also say that Sharon's "no talks
under fire" policy was a position more honored in
the breach than in observance.
Sharon has sent his son Omri — reputed to be
Sharon's closest adviser — for at least two meetings
with Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat.
Sharon insists that he will continue to send his son,
despite the Israel attorney general's reservations
about the use of relatives to conduct affairs of state.
In addition, security talks involving officials from
both sides continue to occur with seeming disregard
for the level of violence.
The agenda in these meetings ostensibly is limited
to security matters, but the line between security ant
diplomatic dialogue is vague.
Moreover, Sharon has been kept informed about a
series of meetings involving Israeli politicians and
businessmen and their Palestinian counterparts.
Among them is Yossi Beilin, the leading Labor
Party dove who no longer is a member of Knesset or
holds any other public position.
Beilin's freelance diplomacy in the early 1990s was
one of the main factors behind the Oslo peace
accords. Sources close to Beilin say privately that he
now is seeking to bring the two sides back to the
negotiating table, and may even be working to
arrange a meeting between Sharon and Arafat.
Also involved is Foreign Minister Shimon Peres,
who met last week with the president of Cyprus and
remarked cryptically that the divided island would
be an ideal spot for belligerents to negotiate.

Related editorial: page 27

