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Ceasefire Pledge Proves False Dawn
JERUSALEM, May 23 (News Agencies) - The reality of a promised ceasefire appeared to evaporate Wednesday, as Palestinians claimed Israel conducted six raids leaving 45 wounded, amid a flurry of talks, plans for more and another call for a summit.
Palestinian officials reported no fewer than six raids into Palestinian-run territory in the Gaza Strip, the latest coming late Wednesday, in which they said Israeli troops bulldozed a house near the Jewish settlement of Netzarim.
General Abdel Raseq al-Majeida, head of Palestinian general security for the Gaza Strip, described it as a "new Israeli aggression against the Palestinian people."
Palestinians said an earlier Israeli raid by the Yebna refugee camp on the southern tip of the Gaza Strip provoked a daylong gunbattle that doctors say had left at least 45 people wounded.
The Israeli army said four anti-tank grenades had been fired on its forces near border with Egypt, where the Yebna camp is located, and that soldiers had returned fire.
The violence came despite Israel saying it would not carry out such operations under the terms of a unilateral ceasefire declared by the Jewish state.
But it was not one-way violence. In the West Bank, an Israeli building foreman was hit as he was driving his car near the Jewish settlement of Ariel and died later in an Israeli hospital.
His death brought to 563 the number of people killed in the Palestinian uprising that broke out in late September - 461 Palestinians, 86 Israelis, 13 Israeli Arabs, two Romanians and a German.
Police also said an elderly Israeli was seriously wounded in the stomach by Palestinians firing at the Gilo Jewish settlement in east Jerusalem from the village of Beit Jala near Bethlehem.
In a new development, Israeli police said Palestinians opened fire on a quarter of west Jerusalem for the first time since late September, but caused no casualties, police said.
An Israeli cabinet spokesman in Jerusalem announced that the government is to meet in extraordinary session Thursday from 8:00 am (0500 GMT), in the wake of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon giving the order Tuesday evening for his troops to observe a unilateral ceasefire with the Palestinians.
Sharon said Wednesday he was waiting for Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat to say publicly that he too was in favor of a ceasefire.
Another statement from Sharon's office said the prime minister received a phone call from U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan late Wednesday, "congratulating him on his initiative towards a ceasefire" with the Palestinians.
"Annan asked Sharon how progress was going towards peace on the basis of the Mitchell report and Sharon replied that he considered the report to be positive as it calls for the immediate and unconditional end to violence, without establishing a link with [Jewish] settlements" in Palestinian territories, the text added.
For his part, Arafat reiterated his call for a new Middle East summit to discuss implementation of the recommendations of the U.S.-led Mitchell Commission.
Speaking after talks with French President Jacques Chirac, Arafat said the meeting should involve those who took part in last October's summit at the Egyptian Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh and members of the Mitchell Commission itself.
Chirac also called for a "real and complete" implementation of the recommendations of the Mitchell report, and praised Arafat's "will for peace."
"We are pleased by the will for peace expressed by president Arafat, by his will to stop all violence and his determination to apply the recommendations of the Mitchell report in their entirety," Chirac's spokeswoman Catherine Colonna quoted the president as telling Arafat.
Arafat did not say if the new summit should be held at the Egyptian venue, but urged that it take place "as soon as possible."
"What is important is that the members of this conference reunite," he said.
And in Egypt, the government press service announced that Arafat would meet Thursday in Cairo with Egyptian counterpart Hosni Mubarak.
The Palestinian leader goes regularly to Egypt for consultations with Mubarak, whose country put forward a recent peace initiative with Jordan setting out plans for a halt to the violence.
Meanwhile, U.S. President George W. Bush had separate telephone conversations with Arafat and Sharon, urging them to "seize the opportunity" to end the fighting and implement the recommendations of the Mitchell Commission.
White House spokesman Ari Fleischer said "both agreed to work with us on a framework for the implementation of the Mitchell committee report."
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