US, UN urge immediate Israeli withdrawal from Palestinian cities
Palestine-USA, Politics, 10/25/2001

US Secretary of State Colin Powell tried to keep up the pressure on Israel last night with a call for immediate withdrawal from the Palestinian-run areas Israeli troops have occupied.

"I think at this time it would be appropriate for the Israeli government to immediately withdraw from the Area A, the villages that they have occupied," he told a joint news conference with British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw.

Powell is the highest US official to say "immediately" in public in asking Israel to withdraw from areas previously returned to the Palestinians under peace agreements.

In talks with Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres on Tuesday, Powell and President George W. Bush pressed for a withdrawal but did not set out a time frame.

Israel rebuffed the request, despite its close alliance with the United States, and Israeli occupation forces killed at least six Palestinians in a fierce air, armour and infantry assault on a West Bank village yesterday.

Powell said it was also important for Palestinian President Yasser Arafat to arrest the people who assassinated Israeli Tourism Minister Rehavam Zeevi in Jerusalem a week ago but he declined to endorse the Israeli government's demand that Arafat turn them over for trial in Israel.

"It's important for Chairman Arafat to do everything within his power to make the arrests of those who were responsible and to get the violence down, to zero preferably but to the lowest level possible," Powell said.

Asked about the Israeli demand for extradition, he said: "I don't want to take a position on it.

Meanwhile, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan called on Israel to end its assault and withdraw immediately from Palestinian towns, saying the action was a dangerous escalation of the conflict and a breach of previously signed agreements.

Annan said he was "very disturbed" that Israel had intensified its occupation despite international calls for Israel to withdraw its army from Palestinian-controlled areas in the West Bank, his spokesman said.

"The secretary-general reiterates that this further dangerous escalation, quite apart from being a breach of signed agreements, only deepens the cycle of violence in the region where tensions are already at a boiling point," UN spokesman Fred Eckhard said.

"The secretary-general calls on Israel to cease this attack immediately, to withdraw all its forces from area A (the Palestinian-ruled areas), and also to ensure that Palestinian ambulances and International Committee of the Red Cross personnel have full access to the wounded in that village," Eckhard said.

The occupation army's West Bank commander said Palestinians involved in the assassination a week ago of far-right cabinet minister Rehavam Zeevi were arrested in the raid on the village of Beit Reema. Israel Radio said the actual killer was still at large.

But another Israeli commander, Colonel Yair Golan, later declined to confirm anyone involved in Zeevi's killing was arrested or killed in the raid.

The Palestinian Authority called it a massacre and blamed it on Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and his army chief.

Previous Stories:
  Arafat, Powell discuss Palestinian conditions in a telephone call   (10/22/2001)
  Guardian: Bush drafts a plan for resuming Palestinian Israeli negotiations   (10/13/2001)
  Bush underlines need for establishing a Palestinian state   (10/13/2001)

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