Clinton Envoy Leaves Stalled Peace Talks
With tensions growing in the West Bank town of Hebron, peace talks between Israel and the PLO stalled again Monday and President Clinton’s peace envoy announced he was leaving the region after failing to clinch a deal.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu blamed Palestine Liberation Organization Chairman Yasser Arafat for the failure to reach agreement on the long-delayed redeployment of most Israeli troops outside the volatile city.
But Arafat, who flew to Norway to get what he called “another push from outside” for peace, denied the charge and accused Israel of “making new conditions every day.”
Palestinian officials also accused Netanyahu’s government of trying to renegotiate agreements already signed by the PLO and the previous Israeli government.
Talks and contacts were expected to continue this week without Clinton’s special Mideast coordinator, Dennis Ross, brokering them. Senior representatives for both sides disputed the notion that the negotiations had broken down.
Still, after more than three weeks of intensive U.S.-mediated bargaining, negotiating positions on both sides seemed to have hardened to an impasse that left the future of Israeli-PLO peacemaking deeply in doubt.
Both sides are concerned about the potential for renewed violence as talks drag on without resolution and tensions continue to build in Hebron. The city holy to Jews, Muslims and Christians, believed to be the biblical resting place of the patriarch Abraham, has a long history of bloodshed. Some of the most militant Jewish settlers in the West Bank live there, and it is a stronghold for Muslim extremists.
On Monday, Israel’s public security minister, Avigdor Kahalani, said police were concerned that Jewish extremists might try to carry out an attack to scuttle the Israeli troop withdrawal.
Jewish settlers from Hebron appealed to Netanyahu to safeguard their security, arguing they will be targets for Arab snipers after a partial troop pullback. However, Palestinians complained that Hebron settlers were shooting at Arab houses in the city Sunday.
On another front, security sources confirmed Monday a published report that defense chiefs have told Netanyahu the army needed an estimated $1.07 billion to prepare for the increased chance of war with Syria.
Since Netanyahu’s hard-line government took power in June, Syria moved up crack paratroop divisions and held military exercises near the disputed Golan Heights, and U.S.-brokered Israeli-Syrian talks have not resumed.