|
Washington Tells Sharon To Ease Restrictions On Palestinians
WASHINGTON, March 20 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon came under pressure from U.S. officials to relax an Israeli crackdown on Palestinians Tuesday.
Sharon's meeting with U.S. President George W. Bush on Tuesday comes one day after he accused the Palestinian Authority of "deepening its involvement in incitement, violence and terror."
In talks with Secretary of State Colin Powell, CIA Director George Tenet, National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice and U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, Sharon quickly encountered U.S. pressure to ease restrictions on Palestinians and release more than $50 million in taxes owed to Yasser Arafat's Palestinian Authority.
Israeli Finance Minister Silvan Shalom has said that the state will not transfer funds to the Palestinian Authority. At issue are some $300 million in value added tax payments mandated for transfer under the Oslo Agreement and the 1994 Paris Accords.
"There is no possibility that we will fund those entities and groups that attack us," Shalom said.
U.S. officials have also raised questions about Israel's possible use of American weapons to carry out targeted killings of Palestinians, who call them assassinations.
"Israel calls on all countries that aspire to peace to make clear to Arafat that his acts are very serious and warn there will be a high price paid for whoever harms innocent civilians and destabilizes the Middle East," Sharon said.
Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres, acting Prime Minister in Sharon's absence, urged a number of world leaders by telephone last night to pressure Arafat to end the violence. He, however, did not issue any proposals to halt Israeli violence against Palestinians or to ease the blockade on the territories.
Sharon told the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) in Washington that no talks were possible until there was an end to Palestinian violence.
He said if violence ended, renewed negotiations could take place and restrictions and economic sanctions imposed by Israel on Palestinians could be lifted.
In the meantime, however, he said he was not prepared to negotiate over the status of Jerusalem, one of the issues Israel says is blocking the search for peace.
Hassan Abdel Rahman, the Palestinian spokesman in Washington, said that it was Sharon who was "militarizing" the situation with "further imposition of closure, starvation and collective punishment".
Meanwhile in Israel, the army re-imposed a partial blockade on the West Bank Palestinian town of Bethlehem, near Jerusalem.
Palestinian Minister of Information Yasser Abed Rabbo also said that Israel had to quit building settlements in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip if it wanted the fighting to stop.
"This is also directed to the American administration, because there are ... American and Israeli parties that are trying to show that the action of the Palestinian people against the occupation and its policy is a violent act while stealing land by force from Palestinians is not," he said.
Arafat has meanwhile called on next week's Arab summit in Amman, Jordan, to act against what he said was Israeli aggression.
The summit is expected to extend political and financial support to the Palestinian Authority.
|
