Mideast Peace Talks Stumble

Palestinians appealed to the United States to rescue negotiations with Israel, after a summit meeting broke up in a crisis ahead of a Feb. 13 goal for a framework peace treaty.

The main disagreement at the summit Thursday between Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat and Prime Minister Ehud Barak was over territory Israel is slated to hand over as part of an interim peace agreement.

Barak told leaders of his One Israel party: "I am convinced that this barrier will be overcome. There is a deep interest by both sides."

But officials said it was unlikely the Feb. 13 target date for the broader peace treaty framework would be met, though Israel denied asking for a delay.

Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said it was "a date that must be respected."

Following the summit and the Palestinian appeal for help, American mediator Dennis Ross met with Erekat. He had been in Jerusalem to monitor progress on the Feb. 13 framework treaty, and had not intended to deal with the interim accord, signed last September in Egypt.

It was assumed that the Barak-Arafat summit would focus on the peace-treaty issues, and not the interim-treaty issues.

However, the Palestinians rejected a remote West Bank territory Israel planned to hand over in the coming days, and instead demanded they be given certain villages bordering Jerusalem. The Israelis said the agreement allowed them to make that decision themselves, but the Palestinians insisted they must be consulted.

Erekat said Arafat told Barak: "How about if we go together - two of your side, two of my side will go to Dennis Ross Friday, to the Americans, and let's arbitrate there."

Israel rejected the idea. After a joint Barak-Arafat news conference was canceled, a sign of Palestinian anger, Foreign Minister David Levy said the two sides must solve their differences by themselves.

The September interim accord was designed to complete the step-by-step, confidence-building approach, begun in 1993, as Israel turned over pieces of West Bank territory to Palestinian civilian control in stages. Instead, each phase has triggered its own crisis.

In the last withdrawal in early January, Israel promised to take into account Palestinian requests for the territory in this latest pullback - though Israeli officials insisted they did not promise to follow the requests.

Charging that the Israelis are trying to dictate terms, Erekat declared, "This must stop. The integrity, honesty and credibility of the peace process is being eaten up by such practices."

Justice Minister Yossi Beilin, an architect of previous Israel-Palestinian accords, said the gaps over the peace treaty framework were too wide to allow for American mediation now. The peace-treaty issues include the future of Jerusalem, Palestinian refugees, Jewish settlements in the West Bank and a border between Israel and a future Palestinian entity.

Beilin said here would be another week to ten days of low-level talks about a framework. "After that, it will be possible to try to outline the overall agreement, where the Americans can fulfill a role," he told Israeli television.

By Mark Lavie
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