|
|
December 12, 2003/Kislev 17 5764, Vol. 56, No. 12
Sharon gets U.S. reprieve
RON KAMPEAS
Jewish Telegraphic Agency
WASHINGTON - The Bush administration's polite "Thanks, but no thanks" to the drafters of the "Geneva accord" peace proposal represented a reprieve of sorts for Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.
However, with the collapse of Palestinian cease-fire talks in Cairo, U.S. pressure to advance the Israeli-Pal-estinian peace process could soon return - and Israel itself may be contemplating dra-matic, unilateral steps.
Israel's deputy prime minister, Ehud Olmert, suggested recently that Israel could take unilateral steps to resolve its Palestinian pro-blem. He suggested withdrawal from parts of the West Bank and Gaza Strip, though not to borders the Palestinians would find acceptable.
The initiators of the Geneva accord spent last week trying to convince U.S. officials that their initiative can help push forward the road map, the official U.S.-backed peace plan.
In a meeting Dec. 5 with the Geneva architects, U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell said he appreciated their efforts but that "there are no short cuts on the way" to peace.
That statement - and the fact that Paul Wolfowitz, the deputy defense secretary, did not meet with the Geneva team - was music to the ears of Israeli government officials who had spent weeks trying to get the Bush administration to reject the accord.
Powell's "final statement was stronger than anything previously," said Mark Regev, spokesman for the Israeli Embassy in Washington.
On a tour of Israel and the Palestinian areas last week, William Burns, President Bush's top envoy to the Middle East, also urged the sides to stick to the road map.
The Geneva proposal's negotiators say their plan complements the road map, which envisions the formation of a Palestinian state by 2005 but does not propose solutions to the most controversial questions dividing Israelis and Palestinians. The Geneva accord, by contrast, goes into great detail on most of the issues.
"There's no doubt that the road map is the leading plan," Amnon Lipkin-Shahak, a member of the Israeli delegation, told reporters. "What we are doing serves to breathe new life into the road map."
In recent months, the Bush administration's focus on rebuilding Iraq and on next year's presidential election has overshadowed its attention to the Israeli-Palestinian con-flict.
Members of the Geneva contingent said they believed their plan renews interest in the peace process and pressures Sharon to pursue solutions to the conflict.
Since the initiative was unveiled, Sharon has spoken of his potential willingness to uproot Israeli settlements in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
Even if U.S. support is tepid, the Geneva accord still has support in the international community.
However, Lipkin-Shahak said the plan's main audience is the Israeli and Palestinian people.
"It's not just a curiosity; there's a hunger to know about the plan," he said. "For the first time, Palestinians are arguing about refugees."
Palestinian officials, however, have told their people that the plan does not renounce the "right of return.''
Washington correspondent Matthew E. Berger contributed to this report.
|
