A meeting of Israeli and Palestinian security officials late Monday night ended inconclusively, with the US blaming both sides for the ongoing fighting in recent days that has seen nine Palestinians and two Jewish settlers dead, said reports.
On Monday alone, Israel assassinated three Palestinians in Jenin, while two others were killed earlier by Israeli soldiers, and yet another two died of wounds from previous clashes.
In the same timeframe, an elderly Palestinian woman died in Ramallah after Israeli troops prevented her from traveling to her village.
Also, Israeli soldiers shot dead a Palestinian in the West Bank overnight Monday in what army officials later admitted was a mistake, said Haaretz newspaper.
Meanwhile, Palestinian fighters killed a Jewish settler.
A second settler was killed and his body was found early Tuesday morning in the southern West Bank.
Two car bombs also exploded Monday morning in the town of Yehud near Tel Aviv. There were no injuries.
"We think the Palestinians have not done enough to fight terror and to end the violence. We also want to make clear that we remain opposed to Israel's policy of targeted killings," said US State Department spokesman Richard Boucher.
"Both sides need to exert maximum efforts to halt the violence and we will continue to urge them to do so," he told a daily briefing in Washington.
Israeli television reported the security meeting, which was attended by a CIA representative and security chiefs from the Israeli and Palestinian sides.
The meeting came with talk of a Middle East ceasefire sounding increasingly hollow.
In Jerusalem, Israeli government spokesman Avi Pazner told AFP: "We absolutely do not have a ceasefire," laying the blame on Palestinian President Yasser Arafat.
"It is quite obvious that on the ground there is absolutely no ceasefire," Pazner said. "Arafat obviously has not issued the orders."
But Arafat himself accused the Israelis of breaking the ceasefire, referring to an Israeli helicopter attack which killed three suspected Palestinian militants overnight.
"It's a flagrant violation of the ceasefire and a crime against our people. We demand international protection," Arafat told journalists in Gaza City after a meeting with UN Middle East envoy Terje Roed-Larsen.
And United Nations' Secretary General Kofi Annan Monday urged Israelis and Palestinians to do their utmost to prevent a collapse of the ceasefire.
"The secretary general urges the parties in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to exercise maximum restraint so that a total collapse of the ceasefire can be prevented," Annan's deputy spokesman said.
But the risk of such a collapse was very much to the fore Monday, as diplomats warned the region could soon explode into full-scale conflict, said the agency.
"The mechanism which could lead to an outbreak of war is now in place, even if no one really wants it," a Western diplomat in Beirut who asked not to be named told AFP.
The deepening crisis was also on the agenda in Alexandria, where Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak met with Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Abdullah bin Abdelaziz Monday for talks.
The Saudi heir was starting a three-day official visit to Egypt at Mubarak's invitation, following a trip to France where he met US Secretary of State Colin Powell.
The prince, the de facto leader of Saudi Arabia due to the declining health of King Fahd, has rejected an invitation to visit the United States because of Washington's perceived support for Israel in its ongoing conflict with the Palestinians.
Arafat arrived in the Mediterranean city for separate talks with Mubarak on the current crisis. Both men met Powell on his recent Middle East tour.
Arafat was scheduled to stay overnight in Egypt and meet Arab League chief Amr Moussa in Cairo on Tuesday, according to Egypt's Al Ahram daily.
The Egyptian and Saudi leaders were set to "discuss developments in the peace process, results of his tour of Europe, the strengthening of bilateral relations and his meeting with Powell," the paper added.
Also on the diplomatic front, France on Monday condemned the Israeli killing of three Palestinian activists three days ahead of a visit to Paris by Israel's hawkish Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.
"Israel's recourse to the extra-judicial execution of Palestinians in premeditated and targeted attacks, outside any legal authority, has always been condemned by France and the European Union," said foreign ministry spokesman Francois Rivasseau.
"The operations cannot be justified. They can only further complicate ongoing efforts to support peace-seeking and dialogue," he said.
Since the outbreak of the latest Israeli-Palestinian conflict last September, CNN reports that Palestinians have killed over 112 Israelis with weapons ranging from stones and knives to machineguns and car bombs. Israeli military sources have reported well over 600 injuries to Israelis of Jewish descent.
In the same time period, according to CNN, Israeli soldiers and armed Jewish settlers have killed 13 Arab Israelis and over 458 Palestinians with weapons ranging from machineguns and tanks to US-made Apache helicopter gunships and F-16s.
According to Amnesty International, nearly 100 of the Palestinians killed were children.
In addition, the Palestinian Red Crescent Society has reported over 14,000 Palestinians wounded, and over 520 killed.
Jewish author Noam Chomsky, who according to a New York Times Book Review article is “arguably the most important intellectual alive,” has been quoted as saying: “State terrorism is an extreme form of terrorism, generally much worse than individual terrorism because it has the resources of a state behind it.” – Albawaba.com
© 2001 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
