Posted on 09/29/2002 1:45:50 AM PDT by HAL9000
A team of senior cabinet ministers, headed by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, met Sunday in Jerusalem, and decided to ease the siege of Palestinian Authority chairman Yasser Arafat's Ramallah headquarters.The IDF will present its plan for redeployment at around noon Sunday, and the withdrawal is expected to start soon thereafter.
The decision conforms to a promise made by Israel to the U.S. over the weekend to bring about a speedy end to the siege. The decision was also reportedly precipitated by a veiled threat by Foreign Minister Shimon Peres to resign, if a solution to the siege was not forthcoming. Peres also criticized Sharon for not informing him of the visit to Washington by Dov Weisglass, head of the prime minister's bureau.
"For the past 18 months, the situation has been deteriorating," Peres told the meeting. "There is no government and no goal. It is not clear where we are headed."
The team, which included Peres, Defense Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer and Chief of Staff Moshe Ya'alon, announced that the troops currently stationed around the compound will withdraw, but will remain close by to ensure that the wanted terror suspects inside the Muqata do not escape.
Any wanted suspected who leaves the compound will be arrested, but those not appearing on the IDF's list of wanted men will be allowed to leave.
The siege was imposed after seven people were killed in back-to-back Palestinian suicide bombings, but it quickly earned the wrath of the United States, which is trying to round up international support for its campaign against Iraq.
Nabil Abu Rudeineh, a senior adviser to Arafat, welcomed the decision, calling it a "victory" for the Palestinian cause.
"The withdrawal should be followed Israel's pullback from all cities to the positions held before September 28, 2000 to give a chance for the peace process to get started," he said.
Ben-Eliezer: Solution close
Earlier Sunday, Defense Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer said that Israel was close to resolving the stand-off at Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat's Ramallah headquarters.
Speaking on Israel Radio on Sunday morning, Ben-Eliezer said that the most likely solution is one in which the wanted Palestinians holed up in the Muqata would be exiled, in a deal similar to the one which ended the siege at Bethlehem's Church of the Nativity.
The defense minister added that, as far as Israel was concerned, anyone inside the Muqata who was not on the IDF's list of wanted terror suspects could leave the compound unimpeded.
Army Radio reported Sunday morning that Israel was close to accepting a deal according to which the militants holed up in the Muqata would be exiled to the Gaza Strip.
Prime Minister Ariel Sharon is expected to convene his cabinet ministers on Sunday, to discuss an end to the siege.
Rice: U.S. expects speedy end to Muqata siege
U.S. President George W. Bush's national security adviser told Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's bureau chief over the weekend that the U.S. expected a speedy resolution of the siege on the Ramallah compound - a situation that "doesn't help" American efforts to galvanize support for the campaign against Iraq.
In a meeting with Dov Weisglass, secretly dispatched to Washington to ease tensions, Condoleezza Rice emphasized that the operation had also halted domestic reforms in the PA that could lead to a new, consolidated leadership not dominated by Arafat.
Israel radio reported late on Saturday night that Rice had told Weisglass that Israel should seize on a solution to the siege "immediately" but that Washington would not mediate.
A U.S. official confirmed Saturday a report by the Washington Post that Bush had sent a personal message to Sharon calling for a swift end to the siege. But the unnamed official strongly disputed any suggestion that Bush had argued that the siege was undermining U.S. efforts to build a coalition against Iraq.
The Washington Post article quotes a Western diplomat as saying that, "The Israelis know that [Iraq] is the big game in town... This [siege] has hurt us, no question about it."
The diplomat is also quoted as saying the prime minister was informed that Israel's swift compliance with this week's United Nations Security Council resolution calling for an end to the siege would allow the American administration "tremendous ammunition" in recruiting allies for any action against Saddam Hussein.
Approved 14-0 with an American abstention, Tuesday's resolution had also called on the Palestinian Authority to ensure that those responsible for terrorist acts were brought to justice.
Israel has since maintained the siege, saying it was not obliged to comply with the council's demand unless the Palestinian leadership fulfilled its requirement to ensure that militants behind suicide attacks on Israelis were brought to justice.
The U.S. decision to abstain from the vote on the resolution was seen as an expression of American displeasure with the Israel's operation, something that was made clear by Bush a few days later when he termed the Israeli action "not helpful."
The report says Sharon was also told that quick Israeli compliance with the UN resolution would give the Bush administration "tremendous ammunition" to use in discussions with potential allies in the Iraq debate, the diplomat was quoted as saying.
The message, delivered by U.S. Ambassador to Israel Daniel Kurtzer, was followed up by phone calls from Bush's national security adviser Condoleezza Rice and Secretary of State Colin Powell.
The article also quotes Palestinian minister Saeb Erekat as saying that the Palestinians would not hand the wanted men inside the compound over to Israel and that "it's really up to the Americans" to push for an end to the stand-off between the two sides.
"It's up to the president of the United States to call [Sharon] and say 'enough is enough,'" Erekat said, adding that he believed the Israeli operation was "hurting [American] policy on Iraq."
UN appeals for resolution to be honored
The UN Security Council on Friday issued a blanket appeal to respect a resolution after the United States blocked a push to single out Israel for ignoring a council directive to end its siege of the Muqata, council diplomats said.
Syrian Ambassador Mikhail Wehbe, acting at the request of Arab nations, had called on the council during a closed-door session to summon Israel's UN envoy and tell him to respect the council's wishes, the diplomats said.
Instead the council issued a statement calling for "the full implementation" of the resolution it passed Tuesday.
Friday's 11-word statement made no mention of Israel or the Palestinians.
Mirroring Tuesday's vote, 14 of the council's 15 members backed the plan put forward by Syria on Friday to summon Israeli Ambassador Yehuda Lancry.
But U.S. envoy Richard Williamson insisted that if Israel's ambassador was to be summoned, the council should also summon Palestinian UN Observer Nasser al-Kidwa, the diplomats said.
After an hour of debate aimed at changing Washington's mind, the council dropped the idea of summoning ambassadors and decided to issue the brief statement.
Palestinian President Yasser Arafat flashes the victory
sign as he walks out of his office after the Israeli
army withdrew from his headquarters in the West Bank
city of Ramallah, September 29, 2002. Arafat said
Israel's troop withdrawal from his headquarters was 'cosmetic' and aimed at 'deceiving the world.'
Photo by Ammar Awad/Reuters
Aaron Lerner Date: 29 September 2002
Israel Television Channel One broadcast footage this evening on the Mabat News program of how wanted terrorists mixed with the crowd of Palestinians who entered Arafat's Ramallah headquarters (Mukata) this afternoon and escaped with the crowd. Some changed clothing with members of the crowd while some were seen leaving fully armed with assault rifles in hand as they made their way undisturbed from the Mukata towards other parts of Ramallah. The IDF dropped the curfew on the city, thus assuring the success of what cynics may call "Operation Open Barn Door."
When the Sharon Cabinet endorsed pulling IDF forces back from the Mukata compound earlier today the cover story was that the "plan" was to intercept any wanted terrorists who would try to escape.
At the time of the announcement of the plan it was already far from clear how the Sharon Administration planned to handle the situation if a mob surged into the Mukata.
This leaves one of two possibilities;
#1 Sharon didn't realize that the obvious scenario would take place and hence did not plan for it.
#2 Sharon knew what was going to happen and thought that opening the barn door would put an end to the problem of the terrorists in the Mukata by allowing them to escape.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.