An agreement between Israel, Arafat
Palestine-Israel, Politics, 5/4/2002

The Lebanese daily al-Sharq unveiled Friday the agreement made between Israel and Yasser Arafat in order to lift the siege imposed on him, noting that this agreement makes it compulsory for the Palestinian authority to collect all weapons from Gaza and halt the violence, and handing over both Ahmad Saadat, the secretary general of the People's Front For the Liberation of Palestine and Fouad al-Showbaki who is accused of being responsible for the weapons ship "Karin A" said to be smuggling weapons to the Palestinians.

The paper quoted high ranking sources that the agreement was made between Muhammad Rasheed -- the economic advisor for Arafat -- and Israel's Benjamin Bin Aliazer and resulted in handing over the persons accused of assassinating the Israeli tourism minister Rahbaam Zeifi and breaking the siege imposed on Arafat.

The agreement speaks of a grace period of six months to make changes on the ground, and the Palestinians will be abide to transfer Arafat to Hisham palace in Areiha as a presidential headquarters and to make changes at all levels of the Palestinian establishments and departments. Washington, the paper said, had redlined certain Palestinian figures and asked to alienate them from the Palestinian authority including the Palestinian official in charge of the file of Jerusalem Surri Nuseibah and to start proper arrangements by the Palestinian organizations to declare giving up violence and to be involved in the foundations of the Palestinian authority.

The sources indicated that after that the process of releasing the Palestinian detainees will start. The European and American aid to rehabilitate the infrastructure is linked to developments on the ground. The sources continued that Israel will continue to have control on the West Bank until Arafat will be able to control the situation in an acceptable way and after the end of the first phase, Washington can sponsor a meeting including Sharon and Arafat and might be held in Washington itself.

About this agreement, Palestinian sources said that despite its heavy weight on Arafat and the difficulty of implementing it, however, accepting the principle of breaking the siege took place at the pressure of his close advisors and that Arafat is in need of intensive Arab consultation to help him in getting out of the current situation.

Previous Stories:
  Al-Zanoun: 2150 Palestinians killed, 36,000 wounded during Intifada   (5/3/2002)
  Israel refuses to dismantle any settlement in Gaza   (5/2/2002)
  UN is awaiting formal reply on Jenin, Annan says   (5/1/2002)

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