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http://www.msnbc.com/news/677951.asp?cp1=1 Powell urges Sharon to reconsider U.S. warns Israel�s tough stance against Palestinians won�t work Palestinian police survey the damage at a security complex hit by a missile from an Israeli warplane in Gaza City on Wednesday. http://a799.ms.akamai.net/3/799/388/9ff142d40b586a/www.msnbc.com/news/140569 0.jpg NBC, MSNBC AND NEWS SERVICES March 6 � U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell on Wednesday offered a surprisingly harsh assessment of Israel�s current response to Palestinian violence, urging Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to reconsider his pledge to intensify the military crackdown. �If you declare war against the Palestinians and think you can solve the problem by seeing how many Palestinians can be killed � I don�t know if that leads you anywhere,� Powell said. TESTIFYING BEFORE a House Appropriations subcommittee on the State Department�s budget, Powell�s tough line toward Sharon contrasted with President Bush�s reaction to the spiraling violence in the Mideast. The bloodshed continued Wednesday as Israel launched its fiercest assault yet in the Gaza Strip in fighting that killed seven Palestinians and two Israeli soldiers. Three other Palestinians died in separate incidents, including a Hamas activist in an explosion at his home. Sharon repeated his vow to intensify the military onslaught, promising Israel would strike �without letup� until Palestinian militant attacks on Israelis are reined in. The relentless violence has overshadowed a number of initiatives to resume peace talks, frustrating the United States and its allies. On Wednesday, a spokesman for U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said violence had got �completely out of hand� and urged both sides� leaders to end it or �history will judge them harshly.� In Washington, Powell�s stern words were unusual because the United States has placed most of the blame for the surge in violence on the Palestinians. Advertisement On Tuesday, for example, Bush blamed only the Palestinians, saying peace was �only possible if there is a maximum effort to end violence throughout the region, starting with Palestinian efforts to stop attacks on Israelis.� But Powell confronted Sharon, who has publicly declared war on the Palestinians and has said Israel intends to continue its bloody assault in reprisal for terror attacks. �Mr. Sharon has to take a hard look at his policies and see whether they will work,� Powell said. The Palestinians are experiencing �enormous difficulties,� Powell said, unable to get to their jobs. And, he said, �everybody is a second-class citizen where you cannot go out for an evening walk� because of fear of attack. Both Israelis and Palestinians are in a tragic situation, he said. �Both sides are following policies that lead to more violence,� he said. ARAFAT CRITICIZED At the same time, Powell was unsparing in criticism of Yasser Arafat. He said despite Israel�s confinement of the Palestinian leader to his West Bank compound, Arafat can use the telephone and is capable of ordering a halt to the attacks. �Mr. Arafat can do more and he must do more,� Powell said. � The obstacles to peace in the Middle East Rep. Dan Miller, R-Fla., also criticized Israel, saying Israeli vigilantes were blowing up Palestinian installations. Powell said peace initiatives by Saudi Arabia, Egypt and the United States will not accomplish anything if the fighting persists. �You can come up with all the ideas in the world but they are not going to move us forward until the violence ends,� Powell said. Bush has praised the peace initiative by Crown Prince Abdullah of Saudi Arabia as a �very positive development� and said he supports Israel�s suggestion for preliminary talks with the Arab kingdom. Abdullah has offered Israel peace and security in exchange for all the land the Arabs lost in the 1967 Six Day War. So far, the proposal is being described by Americans and Saudis as a vision, not a blueprint for peacemaking. Israeli President Moshe Katzav and other Israeli officials have volunteered to go to Saudi Arabia, which has no diplomatic relations with the Jewish state, to pursue the proposal. But the Saudis are cool to the idea. SAUDI REACTION Bush, at a joint news conference Tuesday at the White House with President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt, said he appreciated �those in Israel who are trying to find out exactly what it means.� Bush also praised Mubarak�s offer to act as host for talks between Sharon and Arafat as a move that �will help lead to peace, hopefully.� In Israel, Sharon let it be known that he saw no point in meeting with Arafat while Palestinian attacks were taking a heavy Israeli toll. Mubarak said in a Washington speech that he had refused to meet with Sharon unless Arafat attended as well. Crown Prince Abdullah�s foreign policy adviser, Adel al-Jubeir, said leaders of more than 40 countries support the Saudi initiative, but �Mr. Sharon doesn�t support it. Half his government doesn�t support it.� �We don�t see any indication that the Israeli government accepts even the principle of withdrawal,� al-Jubeir said Tuesday on PBS� �NewsHour With Jim Lehrer.� Support for the plan emerged from a surprising corner Tuesday after Syrian President Bashar Assad met with Abdullah on Tuesday in Saudi Arabia to discuss the proposal, which offers Israel peace, trade and security with the Arab world in return for Israeli withdrawal from Arab territories it seized during the 1967 Mideast war � including the Golan Heights, captured from Syria. �President Assad confirms the convergence of Prince Abdullah�s ideas with (Syria�s) national principles,� the Syrian state newspaper Tishrin said Wednesday. Late Tuesday, the official Saudi Press Agency quoted a Saudi official as saying on condition of anonymity that Assad had �expressed his country�s support of (Abdullah�s) visions for a comprehensive and just solution for the conflict in the region.� Official Syrian newspapers, which reflect government thinking, raised reservations about the refugee question that Assad has expressed before. DAY-LONG OFFENSIVE Meanwhile, in an offensive that began late Tuesday and continued into Wednesday in Gaza, Israel fired on targets from the land, sea and air. After nightfall, Israeli helicopters fired at least six missiles at two Palestinian security buildings in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip, seriously damaging the structures and others nearby, Palestinians said. One person was injured. The Israeli military said the air strike was �part of Israel�s ongoing fight against terror.� Arafat�s home in Gaza City and a U.N.-run school for the blind were badly damaged by shrapnel from an air strike Tuesday night on a nearby security compound. No one was in Arafat�s home at the time; he has been confined to the West Bank town of Ramallah for three months, and his wife and daughter live abroad. At the school, rubble crunched underfoot as young students visited the site Wednesday, accompanied by U.N. officials. The death of Hamas activist, Abdel Rahman Ghadal, was announced over mosque loudspeakers near his Gaza City home, and the announcement blamed an Israeli missile strike � a claim that could not be confirmed. Israel has carried out dozens of targeted killings of those believed to have orchestrated attacks against Israelis. The Israeli strike against Gaza came several hours after Palestinians fired two unguided Qassam rockets late Tuesday, hitting the nearby Israeli town of Sderot in a strike that wounded a baby and slightly injured another child. Israeli F-16 warplanes flattened a two-story office building used by the Palestinian police chief in Gaza, Brig. Gen. Abdel Razek Majaidie. Tanks also moved toward the northern Gaza towns of Beit Hanoun and Beit Lahiya, digging up the main road and building barriers. AMBULANCES BLOCKED? In clashes Wednesday, two Israeli soldiers were killed by Palestinian fire, the military said. The heaviest fighting was reported in the villages of Abassan and Karrara in southern Gaza, where witnesses said 12 tanks moved into the area, drawing intense Palestinian fire. Helicopter gunships fired machine guns toward the gunmen, sending civilians scrambling for cover. A 40-year-old Palestinian woman was killed by a shot in the back, and two other civilians were critically wounded, Palestinian doctors said. Israeli troops barred ambulances from reaching the two wounded men, who died after being left untreated for about three hours, the doctors said. There was no comment by the army. Israeli navy gunboats fired at a Palestinian base on the coast north of Gaza City, killing four members of the Palestinian naval police. One officer died after a shell hit his jeep, and the bodies of three of his colleagues were discovered later Wednesday in the rubble of the base. In the West Bank, Palestinian officials said two Palestinians died at Israeli military checkpoints in separate incidents. The army said one of them was trying to bring in explosives. Israeli helicopters fired missiles at a police station in Halhoul, south of Hebron, after sunset. No one was hurt. �TERRIBLE, TERRIBLE� The escalating violence has fueled debate inside Sharon�s government over whether any political resolution can be found. Citing the �terrible, terrible� recent days, Foreign Minister Peres told journalists that Israel should demand from Arafat a clear-cut declaration that he would halt terror, but also have its own army do everything possible �not to escalate the situation.� A spokesman for another Cabinet minister, Avigdor Lieberman, confirmed a sardonic closed-door exchange during which Peres told Lieberman that excessively harsh measures against the Palestinians could lead to war-crimes accusations. Peres� bitter exchange was reported in the Yediot Ahronot newspaper and confirmed Wednesday by Lieberman�s spokesman, Sagiv Rotenberg. According to the Yediot account, Lieberman urged that Palestinians be told to halt all terror activity or face wide-ranging attacks. �At 8 a.m. we�ll bomb all the commercial centers ... at noon we�ll bomb their gas stations ... at 2 we�ll bomb their banks,� Lieberman reportedly told the meeting before Peres interrupted to say: �And at 6 p.m., you�ll receive an invitation to the international tribunal in The Hague.� NBC�s Martin Fletcher in Tel Aviv, Betsy Steuart in Washington, The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report. ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor ---------------------~--> Buy Stock for $4. No Minimums. 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