Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak on Saturday denied reports that Egypt had agreed with the US to oppose sending international observers to the Occupied Territories, but warned that observers would fail without real intentions to create peace, according to reports.
"I fear that the observers will be afraid that an Israeli will hit one of them, or a Palestinian will hit one of them," Mubarak told reporters, as quoted by AFP. "Each country sends them at its own expense."
"Without a real intention to stop the killing, then neither observers nor anyone else will be able to do anything," he continued. "There must be a definite intention to bring peace to the region."
Mubarak was responding to a question regarding Israeli media reports that Egypt had agreed with the US that there ws no need to send an observer force to monitor a ceasefire in occupied Palestine.
"We said if there's no agreement on sending American observers, then think about sending European observers," he said.
The Group of Eight leading industrialized nations said last month that international observers should be deployed to monitor a tattered truce between Israel and the Palestinians, the first step in the US-brokered Mitchell peace plan, but only if both sides agreed.
The Palestinian side has lent support to the proposal, but Israel has firmly rejected it.
The United States and Egypt on Friday mulled new ideas for resolving the current Middle East crisis, and a senior Egyptian official said the plans could be made public soon.
However, the news blackout made room for contradictory reports on the burst of Cairo-Washington brainstorming.
While the Egyptian papers on Saturday said that Egypt had pressed for international observers to be sent to the Middle East, Haaretz and agencies reported that Egypt had agreed to oppose monitors.
Meanwhile, the London-based Arabic daily Al Sharq Al Awsat said that the US had made a suggestion that would protect Israel from a UN Security Council resolution stipulating that an observer force be dispatched to monitor the situation in the Occupied Territories and Israel.
The council is scheduled to hold a public meeting on Monday to discuss the crisis.
The daily said that Washington had agreed to work for a presidential announcement at the Security Council, which is not binding for UN members, as is the case with a resolution.
In this way, the US would not find itself obliged to veto the possible decision, and still safeguard the interests of Israel, its strongest client state in the region.
Haaretz said that Egypt had agreed to resist an Arab proposal that the international community send observers to the Middle East over Israel's objections.
According to a Haaretz and agencies reports, Osama Al Baz, a top aide to President Hosni Mubarak, said: "We are not thinking of getting the UN to impose anything. Only moves coordinated with Israel and the Palestinians could lead to a real change on the ground."
According to AFP, Baz had said Washington and Cairo would spend the next two days studying ideas put forward during his talks with Secretary of State Colin Powell to end escalating violence between Israel and the Palestinians and bring the parties back to peace negotiations.
"We cannot get into that before we give them (the United States) the courtesy of having enough time to study whatever is said and we are also going to study the ideas they gave us," Baz told reporters after meeting with Powell.
"Within the coming two days we will be to speak with more authority," he said.
Baz was quoted Saturday as saying the coming two weeks would witness more activity on the part of Washington to contain the deteriorating situation in the Middle East.
Meanwhile, asked about Israel's policy of assassinating suspected Palestinian militants, Mubarak said Israel was "making a serious mistake on behalf of the Israeli people ... because operations of violence and revenge operations will continue."
"You can't ask the other side to stop (the violence) while you're destroying their homes and killing them," he said.
The Egyptian leader, whose country became the first Arab state to sign a peace treaty with Israel in 1979, said he was trying to provide the United States with an unbiased account of the Middle East situation in the interests of peace.
"They hear one thing from the Israelis and another thing from the Palestinians, but we tell the truth because we have no interest in supporting this one or that one," he said. "I keep repeating: Egypt supports peace."
Egypt withdrew its ambassador from Tel Aviv in November in protest at Israel's "excessive" use of force against the Palestinians, shortly after the current wave of violence began.
Mubarak said he was planning a tour of various European and Arab countries in September to discuss the prospects for peace in the Middle East – Albawaba.com
© 2001 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
