Friday Crucial To Israeli-Palestinian Truce
Despite a car bomb explosion and gun battles that have endangered the latest cease-fire plan, both Israelis and Palestinians were exercising restraint Friday in an attempt to help the current truce take hold.
Friday is seen as an important test. It is the Muslim Sabbath and midday prayers have often been followed by violent protests.
The car bomb killed two Israelis in Jerusalem Thursday and firefights in Palestinian territories threatened to destroy the cease fire agreement only hours after it was worked out by former Israeli prime minister Shimon Peres and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat before dawn Thursday.
But on Friday Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak struck a conciliatory note.
"We will persevere in our efforts for peace and we will devote all our strength to it," the prime minister said. "We are strong enough to stand on both fronts: the battle for peace and the struggle against violence and terror."
Arafat, speaking in Gaza, has condemned the car-bombing attack, saying: "We are against it completely."
Arafat and Barak had planned to declare a truce Thursday, but it was put off in he wake of the car bomb explosion.
Nevertheless, both sides have taken steps to implement the cease-fire - Israel has pulled back tanks from Palestinian cities, and Palestinian police have restrained some rock-throwing youths.
"The gunfire continues and it's true that there are still clashes," Danny Yatom, Barak's top adviser, said on Israel radio. "At the same time, I believe, from what I know, that the Palestinians are trying to calm the situation."
In Jerusalem, police barred Palestinian men under 45 from praying on Haram as-Sharif or the Temple Mount, a site holy to both Jews and Muslims. In the past, young Palestinians have rioted.
Stone-throwing broke out in the West Bank town of Hebron on Friday afternoon, but no injuries were reported.
A group identifying itself as the military wing of the radical Islamic Jihad has claimed responsibility for the bombing in a statement faxed to The Associated Press office in Damascus, Syria.
The statement said the attack came "in reply to the enemy's crimes against our Palestinian people," and vowed more attacks.
More than 160 people have been killed in five weeks of Israeli-Palestinian fighting, the worst violence since they began peace negotiations in 1993. Most of those killed have been Palestinians.
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