Bush Pans Palestinian State Date

Rebuffing calls from Arab leaders, President Bush said Saturday he is not prepared to offer a timetable for the creation of a Palestinian state.

"We're not ready to lay down any specific calendar, except to say that we have to get started quickly - soon - so we can seize the moment," Mr. Bush said at the conclusion of weekend talks with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.

Despite Mr. Bush's frustration with Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, Mubarak said, "We should give this man a chance."

But Mr. Bush said he was disappointed in Arafat's leadership and called once more on Arafat to "do everything in his power to stop the violence, to stop the attacks on Israel - I mean everything."

In the Mideast itself, fresh violence complicated peace efforts.

Mr. Bush welcomed Mubarak to the Camp David presidential retreat in Maryland's Catoctin Mountains, calling it "a place where we like to welcome our friends." The two had dinner there Friday and held Saturday morning talks that included Vice President Dick Cheney and Secretary of State Colin Powell.

In casual sport coats, the two presidents spoke to reporters afterward from a wooded lane outside Holly Cabin, once the favorite of President Harry Truman.

Mr. Bush gave just a brief opening statement while Mubarak, speaking in Arabic, delivered a lengthy assessment of the crisis in which he accused Israel of "assassinations" and "illegal confiscations."

Mr. Bush fidgeted as Mubarak went on, folding and unfolding his hands, tapping his polished shoes. Cheney, recovering from a leg injury, listened from a nearby golf cart.

Mubarak came to the talks hoping Mr. Bush would set a deadline for Palestinian statehood and ease his criticism of Arafat.

Mr. Bush disappointed him on both points.

He said Mubarak had an "interesting point of view" about Arafat but that there was "plenty of talent" elsewhere among the Palestinians that will emerge "if we develop the institutions necessary for the development of a state."

"Chairman Arafat, as far as I am concerned, is not the issue," Mr. Bush said. "I have constantly said I am disappointed in his leadership. I think he has let the Palestinian people down. Therefore, my focus is on the reforms necessary to help the Palestinians."

The Bush administration has been reaching out to other Palestinians as it seeks to coax the Palestinian Authority to reform, including its splintered security force, in order to create the conditions for peace negotiations.

And the president was vague about any deadline.

"Here's the timetable I have in mind," Mr. Bush said. "We need to start immediately in building the institutions necessary for the emergence of a Palestinian state which, on the one hand, will give hope to the Palestinian people and, on the other hand, say to the world, including the neighborhood, that there is a chance to live in peace, to defeat terror."

Mubarak had gone to Camp David hoping to persuade Mr. Bush to support declaring the state of Palestine early next year, and do so before negotiations on the new state's final border.

Mubarak countered Mr. Bush's remarks by saying violence would not end unless "the people feel there is hope for peace."

Switching to English, Mubarak appealed on Arafat's behalf: "We should give this man a chance. We are working very hard with cooperation with the United States for the reform in the Palestinian Authority. Such a chance would prove that he is going to deliver or not. If he is going to deliver, I think everybody would support him. If he is not going to deliver, his people will tell him that."

Mr. Bush, taking pains to find common ground with Mubarak, noted that the Egyptian president did not commit to dealing with Arafat, but asked that the Palestinian leader be given a chance to deliver.

In sharply contrasting harsh tones, Mubarak laid down a list of demands on Israel.

"Israel must end the siege imposed on the Palestinian people and withdraw its forces to positions occupied on Sept. 28, 2000, and halt assassinations and repeated incursions in the territories under the control of the Palestinian Authority and immediately halt all settlement activities in the occupied territories, including the illegal confiscation of land and the expansion of settlements under the pretext of natural growth or any other consideration," the Egyptian leader said.

Mr. Bush had invited Mubarak to the secluded, wooded retreat hoping he would play an instrumental role in leading Palestinians to the peace table, much like his predecessor, Anwar Sadat, did in forging the first peace accord between Israel and an Arab state. Islamic radicals assassinated Sadat after he signed that 1979 Egypt-Israeli treaty.

Mubarak thanked Mr. Bush, who refused to get involved in the conflict before this year, for stepping in to try to mediate the crisis.

"Your personal role, Mr. President, and the role of the United States today remains as important as was America's contribution to us reaching the peace treaty between Egypt and Israel more than two decades ago," Mubarak said.

Privately, reports CBS News correspondent Joie Chen, a senior administratin official says the president was pleased with the outcome of his talks with Mubarak, since Arab leaders now seem to understand their role in pushing the peace process forward.

Mr. Bush meets with Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon at the White House on Monday. The president hopes to assemble a peace plan - concrete suggestions for Israel-Palestinian negotiations and perhaps some sort of timetable for creation of a Palestinian state - for unveiling in a national address before a Mideast peace conference in Turkey this summer.

Correspondent Chen says this weekend marks something of a last chance for both sides in the Mideast conflict to make their cases to Mr. Bush.

His diplomatic offensive was complicated this week after a car-and-bus explosion killed 17 Israelis. Sharon's government responded by dispatching troops to Arafat's compound in Ramallah and to the West Bank town of Jenin, the hometown of the 18-year-old Islamic extremist who detonated the explosion.

On Saturday, Palestinian gunmen sprayed bullets through a cluster of mobile homes as the Jewish settlers inside were sleeping Saturday, killing three people including a pregnant woman and her husband.

The attack on Karmei Tsur, a settlement of about 100 families in the southern West Bank, began shortly after 2 a.m.

One attacker was killed and a second escaped. Israeli troops in armored vehicles entered a nearby Palestinian town as helicopters trained spotlights on the area in a pre-dawn search for the gunman.

In the Gaza Strip, three Palestinians were killed in two attempted attacks on Israelis. One was an armed man who was swimming toward a Jewish settlement on the Mediterranean Sea, the Israeli army said.

"Once again we are witnessing an act of terrorism being launched from the Palestinian territories, as a result of the Palestinian Authority's refusal to take action against terrorism," the military said in a statement.

But Arafat spokesman Nabil Abu Rdeneh said, "the Israelis should blame themselves, they failed at the political level and at the security level as well.