Doubts abound over Arafat's role at Arab peace summit

JERUSALEM - Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon was yesterday convening senior ministers to discuss allowing Yasser Arafat to travel to a Beirut summit where Arab leaders are looking to endorse a peace proposal.

But the Palestinian leader's chances of making the summit set for this week looked slim, as another round of United States-led ceasefire talks ended inconclusively.

Israeli-Palestinian violence raged on in the occupied territories, where Arafat is confined.

The two sides broke off talks on Sunday to study a compromise plan by US mediators trying to establish a ceasefire.

In the continuing violence, Israeli troops killed four unidentified armed infiltrators from Jordan and four Palestinians in the Gaza Strip who they thought were about to attack Jewish settlements.

Two Israelis were shot dead in separate incidents in the West Bank. Palestinian gunmen ambushed a bus, killing a Jewish settler on the way to her job as a kindergarten teacher, and a Jewish settler was shot dead while driving his car.

Early yesterday, Israeli tanks and armoured bulldozers entered a Palestinian refugee camp in the southern Gaza Strip.

One local Palestinian man was reported killed and at least two wounded as bulldozers, under covering fire, demolished buildings in the Brazil refugee camp.

Both Palestinian and Israeli sources said Sunday's talks ended inconclusively but each side was looking at a US formula to resolve disputes over terms for a truce.

The two sides met separately with US envoy Anthony Zinni, who failed in two earlier bids to defuse a conflict inflamed by Palestinian suicide bombings and Israeli offensives into towns earlier handed over to Palestinian rule.

The talks ended without results, but the sides agreed to convene again today.

Neither side released details of the proposed compromise, but Israel's Channel 2 television said one element was to shorten the time for implementing the nine-month-old US truce plan from the four weeks demanded by Israel to two weeks.

Arafat has been restricted to his West Bank headquarters in Ramallah by the Israeli Army since December.

US officials were believed to be keen for Arafat to attend the summit to give momentum to a Saudi peace plan as Washington seeks Arab support for a campaign against Iraq.

Most Arabs also see Arafat's presence as vital to the peace initiative.

US Secretary of State Colin Powell said during a visit to El Salvador that he hoped for progress at the Beirut summit.

Palestinian officials said earlier that Arafat, 72, intended to be at the summit, which would be his first trip abroad since December and his first to Beirut since 1982, when he was ejected by Israeli forces who invaded Lebanon to rout his guerrillas.

But Israel has said Arafat can go to Beirut only if he carries out a US plan to staunch the violence, and can return only if he avoids "incitement" in his speech to the summit.

Mohammed Dahlan, a top Palestinian security official, said earlier that Arafat was ready to forego attending the summit rather than accept "unfair" Israeli ceasefire conditions.

More details have emerged of the Saudi plan.

Palestinian Planning Minister Nabil Shaath said it demanded the withdrawal of Israel to the Palestinian, Syrian and Lebanese frontiers as they were on the eve of the 1967 Middle East War.

It also called for resolving the plight of some 3.6 million Palestinian refugees and establishing an independent Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital, he said.

"In return, the Arabs will be ready to have normal relations with Israel and to sign a peace treaty with Israel. They will ensure security for Israel, Palestine and all the countries around."

Although he said the plan had unanimous Arab support, diplomats think Syria may try to dilute the wording on normalising ties with Israel.

- REUTERS

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