Jordan Times
Wednesday, January 19, 2005
Jordan, EU tell Israel to give
PA leader chance
Agencies
Jordan on Tuesday urged Israel not to burden Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas
with more than he can bear under the current circumstances.
The Jordan News Agency, Petra, quoted Foreign Minister Hani Mulki as telling his
Israeli counterpart Silvan Shalom over the telephone that the Jewish state
should resume peace talks with the Palestinians.
Mulki, who earlier discussed related issues over the telephone with his
counterpart Nabil Shaath and Abbas, said Israel should also give the Palestinian
leader enough time to organise his internal affairs, according to Petra.
For his part, Shalom was quoted by Agence France-Presse as saying that “Israel
expects Jordan to work with Abbas and help him fight militancy.”
“Israel expects Jordan, which also has a clear interest in seeing the end of
terror and a return to the path of dialogue, to work together with Abu Mazen [Abbas]
to bring about the required steps,” Shalom said during the telephone
conversation, according to AFP.
Mulki and Shalom also discussed ways of restoring confidence between Israel and
the Palestinian National Authority in a bid to reengage the two sides in peace
talks.
The European Union also urged Israel Tuesday to give Abbas “a chance” to
persuade fighters to stop attacks on Israeli targets.
Speaking ahead of a visit to the region, the EU's Luxembourg presidency paid
tribute to Abbas, who is trying to secure ceasefire pledges from groups like
Hamas and Islamic Jihad.
“We have to say to the Israelis that they must give [Abbas] a chance. He is a
man who has always refused violence and the use of force,” said Foreign Minister
Jean Asselborn, whose country took over the EU reins on January 1.
“We have to give him a chance, the time and means to organise things so that he
can take adequate steps to ensure that violence disappears in Gaza,” he told the
foreign affairs committee of the European Parliament.
On Monday, Minister of Culture and Government Spokesperson Asma Khader warned
Israel against stepping up military activities in the Palestinian territories,
saying it would undermine hopes for peace under a new Palestinian leadership.
Earlier Tuesday, a senior Israeli official said the Jewish state would give
Abbas a limited amount of time to allow him to crack down on Palestinian
factions.
Abbas on Monday ordered his security services to prevent attacks by groups such
as Hamas.
Arabs say Israel seeks to make Abbas second Arafat
Other Arabs, meanwhile, say Israel has seized an early opportunity to boycott
Abbas as a means to put off peace talks with the Palestinians while expanding
West Bank settlements.
Israel cut all ties with Abbas after Palestinian fighters killed six Israelis at
a Gaza crossing point, even before he was sworn in on Saturday to replace the
late Yasser Arafat.
Israel and Washington had sidelined Arafat for more than two years because they
accused him of condoning and orchestrating violence, which Arafat denied.
“All the talk in the past about Arafat not being a partner for peace is now
repeating itself, only replacing one Palestinian name with another,” Arab League
spokesman Hossam Zaki was quoted by Reuters as saying.
“Israel is not willing to go forward. It is looking for excuses, exploiting each
and every incident in order to stop any chances for progress,” he said.
Abbas' election raised hopes Israeli-Palestinian peace talks would resume after
four years of violence.
But Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said he would not meet Abbas until he
reined in militant groups behind Thursday's attack.
Egyptian political analyst Diaa Rashwan said Sharon, who has given the Israeli
army a free hand to strike fighters in Gaza, wanted to put off talks on the main
causes of the conflict.
“Sharon prefers to talk about this attack here or that attack there. But he
never wants to discuss the Palestinian state, the right of return, Jerusalem,”
he said. “His ambition is keep the maximum that he can of the West Bank,” he
added.
Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak urged Sharon on Sunday to follow the example of
assassinated Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and pursue peace talks despite
attacks.
“Experience says that it will never be possible that we can go on with
negotiations if we say that all violence must stop,” he said.
Thwarting Abbas
Abbas has called for a ceasefire with Israel to allow talks to resume and
ordered security forces to prevent attacks against Israelis. But fighters, some
warning there could be clashes with Palestinian forces, ruled out any halt to
attacks before an end to what they call Israeli aggression.
Arab analysts base their conclusions about Sharon's motives on their assessment
that Abbas cannot crack down on Palestinian fighters by force without provoking
civil war.
Egyptian political analyst Abdel Monem Said said: “They are asking for the
impossible, and they know they are asking for the impossible because they
undermined the infrastructure of authority in the Palestinian territories.”
Sharon has said an end to “terror and violence” must precede any resumption of
peace talks under a US-backed peace plan charting a course to a Palestinian
state.
He is planning to withdraw Israeli settlements from the Gaza Strip this year,
but he has made clear Israel plans to keep large chunks of the West Bank.
“The problem is Sharon and his expansionist plans and not the intentions of
Mahmoud Abbas,” Talal Suleiman wrote in Lebanon's Al Safir newspaper. Through
his Gaza withdrawal plan, Sharon aimed to hide his aim of annexing the West Bank
through settlement expansion, he said.
“Sharon has not and will never be close to taking a step towards any settlement
which does not imply a complete surrender to his terms, greed and terrorism,” Al
Khaleej newspaper in the United Arab Emirates wrote in an editorial.
Washington, key to driving forward Middle East peace, has swung behind Israel
and called on Abbas to bring the militants under control.
It was essential for Washington to look at the fundamental causes of the
conflict if it was to be solved, Abdel Wahab Badrakhan wrote in the Saudi-owned
pan-Arab Al Hayat newspaper.
“Otherwise the mentality of the `war on terror' is again a candidate for a
deliberate thwarting of Abu Mazen as it was a deliberate thwarting for Arafat to
justify besieging him and annulling him as a partner in peace negotiations,” he
wrote.