http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/08/04/africa/mideast.1-109215.php
Abbas and Olmert to meet in West Bank, officials say By Isabel Kershner Saturday, August 4, 2007 JERUSALEM: The Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, and the Israeli prime minister, Ehud Olmert, will meet on Monday in the West Bank, Palestinian officials said Saturday in describing what would be the first meeting of the two leaders in Palestinian territory. An Israeli government spokesman could not immediately confirm the date or location of the proposed meeting, but said that one would take place "very soon." A gap was already becoming apparent, though, between Palestinian expectations and Israel's stated intentions regarding the agenda of the meeting, which the Palestinians said would take place in Jericho. An Abbas aide, Nabil Amr, said the leaders must be ready to hold "political" talks that include final-status issues for the creation of a Palestinian state, including borders, according to Reuters. An Israeli government spokesman, David Baker, said more vaguely that Israel was prepared to "mention larger issues in the realm of the future" but would not negotiate on these issues at such meetings. The two leaders had originally planned to meet in Jericho in early June, but the Palestinian side called off that meeting, in part because Israel refused to release tax money it had collected on behalf of the Palestinian Authority since the Islamic militant group Hamas came to power in early 2006. Later in June, Hamas violently seized control of the Gaza Strip, leading Abbas, of the rival Fatah faction, to fire the Hamas-led unity government and set up an alternative, Western-backed caretaker government in the West Bank. Since then, with U.S. encouragement, Israel has undertaken a series of gestures intended to buttress Abbas's standing and show the Palestinians the benefits of moderation. So far, the gestures have included a resumption of the transfer of tax revenue owed to the Palestinian Authority and the early release of 250 Palestinian prisoners from Israeli jails. The two sides also agreed to immunity for a number of militants of Al Aksa Brigades, the Fatah-affiliated militia, who were wanted by Israel. Under the terms of the deal, the men have to hand over their weapons to the Palestinian Authority and sign a pledge to cease all violence against Israel. In return, Israel will no longer pursue them. In addition, Olmert and Abbas agreed at a summit meeting in late June in the Egyptian resort of Sharm el Sheik to meet every two weeks. The leaders last met in Jerusalem on July 16. The growing diplomacy between Israel and Abbas's government is fragile and fraught with potential pitfalls. For example, Ashraf al-Ajrami, the Palestinian minister of prisoners' affairs in the caretaker government, told the Palestinian independent news agency Maan on Friday that Israel had suspended progress on the immunity deal because several of those included in the original list had failed to hand over their weapons. Security officials in Israel would not confirm or deny the report, but one said: "Those who do not comply with the conditions will be subject to the ramifications of their actions. We are monitoring those who did sign off on the pledge." One member of Al Aksa Brigade in Bethlehem, West Bank, who had signed the pledge said in a recent interview that he had not handed in his weapon because he had lost it while he was moving from place to place as a fugitive. Another stated that he had never owned a gun. Ajrami said Saturday that the issue of the wanted men was close to being resolved. Palestinian officials are impatient to resume negotiations on the core issues of a peace settlement including the final borders of a future state, the status of Jerusalem and the refugees, raising expectations that might be frustrated. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Thursday during a visit to the region that Olmert was ready to discuss "fundamental issues" leading to the creation of a Palestinian state. The Israeli prime minister has floated the idea of reaching a joint "declaration of principles" with the Palestinians, an idea that Abbas endorsed. But Palestinian officials have made it clear that the fundamental issues include borders, Jerusalem and the refugees, while Israel's foreign minister, Tzipi Livni, said in a joint news conference with Rice that "sometimes it is not wise to put the most sensitive issues first." Instead, she suggested focusing on the "widest common denominator." Israel "is to make a historic decision concerning the building of a nuclear power plant" in the Negev desert, according to Infrastructure Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer. Ben-Eliezer told an engineer's conference in the Israeli coastal town of Herzliya that the project would be presented to the government for approval in the coming months, Israeli Army Radio reported over the weekend. Officials in the prime minister's office had no comment on the report. On Wednesday, Israel's largest circulation daily, Yediot Aharonot, wrote that the revival of decades-old plans for a nuclear power plant presents a dilemma for Israel because it would come under pressure to accept international supervision of its nuclear programs. Israel has long maintained a policy of what it calls "nuclear ambiguity," neither confirming nor denying its possession of nuclear weapons. In what appeared to be a slip of the tongue last December during an interview with a German television network, Prime Minister Olmert implied that Israel has a nuclear weapons capability. Copyright © 2007 The International Herald Tribune | www.iht.com [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] Post message: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe : [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe : [EMAIL PROTECTED] List owner : [EMAIL PROTECTED] Homepage : http://proletar.8m.com/ Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/proletar/ <*> Your email settings: Individual Email | Traditional <*> To change settings online go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/proletar/join (Yahoo! ID required) <*> To change settings via email: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
