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Mini Arab Summit Slams “All Forms Of Violence”
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Leaders
denounced Israeli "war crimes" in Jenin
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IslamOnline
& News Agencies) - The leaders of Egypt, Syria and Saudi Arabia
said here Saturday, May 11, the Arabs were determined to make peace
with Israel and rejected "all forms of violence."
The
statement comes after the Saudis this week spoke of mutual U.S. and
Arab responsibilities toward stopping the 19-month-old spiral of
Israeli-Palestinian violence and reviving moribund peace negotiations,
reported Agence France-Presse (AFP).
Egyptian
President Hosni Mubarak, Syrian President Hafez Al-Assad and Saudi
Arabia's Crown Prince Abdullah bin Abdel Aziz ended their three-hour
summit in the Red Sea resort of Sharm El-Sheikh with the new appeal
for peace.
The
three key Arab leaders "restated the Arabs' sincere determination
to achieve peace and their rejection of all forms of violence,"
according to the statement read by Egyptian Information Minister
Safwat Al-Sherif.
The
leaders did not refer to terrorism or to Palestinian resistance
attacks in their communiqué, but they specifically denounced alleged
Israeli "war crimes" against the Palestinians and made
specific reference to Israeli actions in the West Bank town of Jenin,
reported BBC’s online news service.
Before
the meeting began, President Mubarak revealed he had spoken directly
by telephone to the Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon on Thursday,
May 9, urging him not to carry out any large-scale military attack on
the Gaza Strip in response to the latest suicide bombing south of Tel
Aviv, said BBC.
The
U.S. government has repeatedly called on Arab leaders to seek an end
to what it calls “Palestinian suicide bombings” against Israeli
civilians, while the Arabs expect Washington to force Israel to halt
its military assault on the Palestinians, AFP reported.
Saudi
foreign minister Prince Saud Al-Faisal told the Washington Post in an
interview published Saturday that the Saudi “have been counseling
that these efforts [suicide bombings] are not helpful to the peace
process. ... Everybody is in constant contact.”
According
to the Post, Prince Abdullah was convinced after meeting with
President George W. Bush last month that the U.S. leader was ready to
engage in a major push to reach peace between Israelis and
Palestinians after 19 months of violence.
Saudi
officials have been telling Arafat in "constant" calls that
in order for U.S. peace efforts to be successful, the activities of
resistance groups such as Hamas and Islamic Jihad, both of which
figure on the U.S. list of foreign terrorist organizations, must be
curbed, Faisal told the Post.
Palestinian
international cooperation minister Nabil Shaath, who was here for
talks with top Egyptian and Saudi diplomats, said the Palestinians
were "very serious" about stopping “suicide bombings”
against civilians in Israel.
"There
is a big difference between pursuing the legitimate resistance and
pursuing suicide attacks," Shaath said when asked about Riyadh's
efforts to end attacks on Israelis.
Abdullah, who announced his own initiative for Arab-Israeli peace in
February that has since won broad Arab support, attended the summit
here after meeting with U.S. President George W. Bush in Texas last
month.
Arab
diplomats said the summit was designed to promote new U.S.-Saudi
efforts for peace.
And
the final statement said the Saudi-sponsored initiative adopted at the
Arab summit in Beirut in March "is the basis for any Arab step to
achieve the hoped-for just and comprehensive peace."
The
initiative calls on the Arabs to enter peaceful and normal relations
with Israel in return for its full withdrawal from all lands occupied
in the 1967 war.
Both
Syria and Egypt earlier expressed longstanding fears that chances of
peace under Sharon were slim.
Egyptian
Foreign Minister Ahmed Maher earlier rejected Sharon's ideas for an
international Middle East peace conference where "he
decides" who will attend and what will be discussed.
Maher
said it was "out of the question" for a conference to
ignore, as Sharon wishes, a final settlement and discuss only a
"very long-term interim agreement" for the Palestinians.
The
proposed conference, on which Washington is trying to find middle
ground, was to have been raised at the summit here.
Sharon
on April 14 proposed to the United States that it organize a peace
conference grouping Israeli, Palestinian, Egyptian, Jordanian, Saudi
and Gulf state representatives and perhaps Morocco, but exclude
Palestinian President Yasser Arafat.
Before
Assad arrived, Syria's official Tishrin daily newspaper said the
mini-summit in Egypt must take into account that Sharon refuses to
make peace with his neighbors.
Syria
has usually taken a tough line in meetings with other Arab countries,
calling for a renewal of the Arab boycott of Israel and cutting Arab
ties with it.
In
a further sign of cooperation with the United States, Saudi Arabia and
other Arab oil producers meeting Saturday in Cairo pledged to maintain
market stability after Mubarak appealed against using oil as a
political weapon.
Egypt,
which in 1979 became the first Arab country to make peace with Israel,
has traditionally played a prominent Arab role in promoting a
comprehensive Middle East peace.
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