Israel, Palestine trade charges, rule out new summit

Israel, Palestine trade charges, rule out new summit
PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

JERUSALEM, AUG 20: Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat has demanded that Israel resolve the most contentious issue of Jerusalem, while the Jewish state ruled out a new peace summit in the near future if Palestinians did not show flexibility in ending the 52-year-old conflict.

"Before he (Israeli Premier Ehud Barak) ends the conflict, he must resolve the most important issue of Jerusalem, which is not only important to the Palestinians, but also to the Arab nation and Christians," Arafat told reporters in Gaza upon his arrival from New Delhi.

Arafat had held meetings with Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee and President K R Narayanan on the last leg of his whirlwind tour of Asia to drum up support for unilateral declaration of Palestinian statehood.

Israel's acting foreign minister Shlomo Ben Ami ruled out the possibility of a follow-up summit to the last month's Camp David negotiations if Palestinian leadership did not reflect flexibility related to core issues.

"I do not see any chance for a summit, I do not see any chance for an agreement if there is not real flexibility on the other side," Ben Ami told Israeli army radio.

According to reports attributed to Prime Minister's office, Barak has told US special envoy Dennis Ross during a meeting that as long as Israel did not see any signs of flexibility from Arafat, a US-sponsored additional summit was not required.

Ross is currently in the region holding talks with Arab-Israeli leaders to narrow down gaps for a final peace deal before September 13, the date set by Arafat for declaration of an independent state.

Ross, who was in Egypt yesterday to brief the country's foreign minister Amr Moussa on his visit, is believed to be trying to get Cairo's support for any compromise proposal on the contentious issue of Jerusalem and refugees.

According to Barak's office, Ross told the prime minister during the meeting that US President Bill Clinton plans to meet separately with him and Arafat during the UN General Assembly meeting next month.

Barak has also made it clear that he views a declaration ending the conflict as a precondition to a Palestinian declaration of statehood.

"If the Palestinian leadership is truly prepared to deal with the challenge of setting up a Palestinian state and solving the plight of its people, it must understand that the condition for it is the end of the conflict with Israel," Barak said during a function on Friday.

Sources close to Barak said they did not see any signs of flexibility on the part of Palestinians who are believed to be expecting that Ross would bring with him new ideas on how to break the deadlock on Jerusalem and the Palestinian refugee issue.

Palestinian negotiators who have met with Ross denied that Americans had presented any new proposal and ruled out chances of a new summit in the near future, saying Israel was being inflexible by demanding to "annex large parts of the West Bank" and sovereignty over most of Jerusalem.

"The Israelis think they can outsmart the whole world by claiming they were flexible while we were the hardliners," reports from Gaza quoted a senior Palestinian negotiator as saying.

While 15 days of intensive negotiations at Camp David did not yield any agreement last month, Israeli and Palestinian negotiators have been meeting informally since in a bid to narrow down differences on crucial issues, including the fate of Jerusalem, as a prelude to a possible new follow-up summit.

Jerusalem, captured by Israel in 1967 war, has remained the biggest obstacle in the peace negotiations. While Israel considers the city as its united, eternal capital, Palestinians want East Jerusalem as capital of their future state.