After Israeli Prime Minister Ariel twice vetoed a much-anticipated meeting between Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres and Palestinian President Yasser Arafat, the US on Sunday expressed its support for the seemingly unlikely meeting, according to AFP.
On Sunday, Israeli Housing Minister Natan Sharansky told Radio Israel that there would be no meeting between Arafat and Shimon Peres, quashing hopes for renewed peace talks.
US Secretary of State Colin Powell phoned Peres later Sunday to tell him his planned meeting with Arafat was "urgent," AFP cited a Peres spokesman as saying.
Powell had reportedly told Peres it was "urgent for the meeting to take place" and had pressed him to "continue his efforts to establish a ceasefire" between Israel and the Palestinians, according to the spokesman.
Powell's call echoed Peres' position on the issue.
In a protest against Sharon's veto, Peres has confined himself to his residence, Israeli TV reported on Sunday, adding that the FM would take some time to think over his political future.
Peres had warned that if Sharon blocked his planned meeting with Arafat at Gaza Airport, the step would result in "severe consequences for the government coalition."
Peres made the statement to Shas Party leader Eli Yishai at the weekly cabinet session, which the Jerusalem Post said was convened at the request of Yishai and far-right National Union Party.
Both demanded that the inner cabinet convene to decide whether the Peres-Arafat meeting could take place, it said.
The much-delayed meeting to try to work out a ceasefire had been scheduled to be held at 5:00pm (1400 GMT), AFP reported, citing a high-level Palestinian official.
Meanwhile, Israeli Industry and Trade Minister Dalia Itzik of the Labor Party said she and her colleagues would throw their weight behind Peres if necessary.
If the meeting is called off, "All of us - to a man - are out of the coalition," Itzik told Army Radio.
"If Shimon Peres is humiliated in any manner, we will allow nothing to come between us and Shimon Peres," Itzik said.
In Peres' office Saturday, there was talk of the "great efforts that Arafat and the Palestinian Authority were making to stop terrorism and in preventive actions."
Defense Minister Benjamin Ben Eliezer seemed to echo those words when he said that he saw "a clear trend toward an end to the violence" on the part of the Palestinians.
Sharon vetoed the scheduled meeting for the second time Sunday, despite a day of relative calm on the ground and heavy international pressure for the talks to go ahead.
Sharon insists that Arafat completely halt the violence for 48 hours before any talks with Peres can go ahead, saying that Israel refuses to negotiate under fire.
"Yasser Arafat has not passed the test of 48 hours of total calm that the prime minister set last Sunday as a condition for a Peres-Arafat meeting," a high-ranking Israeli official, who asked not to be named, told AFP.
Israel insists it will not compromise the safety of its citizens, saying Arafat may be trying to score political points by dragging it into talks before the violence on the ground has halted.
"We cannot depend on miracles, that is why the 48 hours of calm must be observed," said Israeli minister without portfolio Zipi Livner.
She said five mortar bombs targeted a synagogue in the Jewish settlement of Kfar Darom in the Gaza Strip on Saturday night.
"This is organized and is something...Arafat can prevent," she said. "The ball is in his court."
It was under US pressure that Israel and the Palestinians declared a ceasefire nearly a week ago, creating a truce which has since been shaken by renewed violence.
However, Sharon did not rule out a meeting in the days to come, the official said.
"The Israeli government has our address, they know where they can inform us," chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said, explaining that his side had not been officially informed of the cancellation.
Other officials said the meeting was still possible and that they were counting on international pressure to break the deadlock, said AFP.
Meanwhile, Israeli tanks made a brief incursion into Palestinian-controlled land in the Gaza Strip in response to the mortar attack.
The United States, in the wake of the September 11 terror attacks which killed thousands of people in New York and Washington, has urged Israel to press on with the meeting, intended to re-launch the Middle East peace process and end the year-long Palestinian Intifada, or uprising, which has claimed more than 800 lives, the vast majority of them Palestinians, including around 100 children.
Initial talks would focus on establishing a more effective ceasefire that, if it lasted, would open the door to the implementation of the Mitchell plan.
However, Israel has repeatedly blocked Palestinian appeals for international monitors for such a ceasefire.
The plan calls for a six-week cooling-off period and a freeze on Jewish settlements in the Palestinian territories.
Peres met Erekat and Palestinian Parliament Speaker Ahmed Qorei Saturday as part of the preparation for the meeting.
The Israeli army's head of planning, Major Giora Eiland, laid out plans for easing the blockade on Palestinian territories and re-deploying Israeli forces following a withdrawal from reoccupied autonomous Palestinian land last week, AFP reported, citing unnamed diplomatic sources.
If Peres and Arafat do meet, then the two will release a joint statement which was drafted at a meeting Saturday between Peres and leading Palestinian negotiators Abu Ala and Erekat in Tel Aviv.
According to Haaretz, citing Israeli sources, these are the main points of the would-be joint communiqué:
* A commitment to the cease-fire and the implementation of the Tenet understandings (security measures) and of the Mitchell Report (gradual movement toward a renewal of the diplomatic negotiations).
* Redeployment of the Israeli army to positions held before the outbreak of the Intifada a year ago.
* Resumption of the joint security coordination committee, headed by a CIA representative.
* An end to incitement.
* Lifting of closures and opening the roads connecting the Palestinian towns.
* Issuing work permits to Palestinians to enter Israel - Albawaba.com
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