Bush Gives Sharon Green Light to Hit Back if Attacked by Iraq

17/10/2002| IslamWeb

HIGLIGHTS: William Burns to Start a 2-Week Visit to the Middle East||Peres Meets Ereqat: Palestinian Official||Israel to pay Palestinian Revenue Confisicated During 2 Years of Intifadha, Uprising Confrontations||Palestinian Killed in Rafah, 15 Others Wounded Including 9 Children||So-called Rouge Settlements Dismantled|| STORY: Speaking to reporters along with Israeli Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon after talks at the White House in Washington Wednesday, U.S. President, George Bush, defended Israel's right to hit back if targeted by Iraqi missiles in any U.S.-led war against Saddam Hussein.

But aides at the White House later clarified that the Bush administration hoped Israel would hold its fire to help keep any Arab allies on side in a conflict with Baghdad.

BURNS TO START A 2-WEEK VISIT TO THE REGION

Washington's chief Middle East mediator, Assistant Secretary of State William Burns, will start a two-week visit to the region on Friday after a months-long absence. Among his tasks will be to work on Palestinian reforms, Bush told reporters.

The U.S. president was believed to be keen to get Sharon's assurances that Israel would try to avoid aggravating conflict with Palestinians that could hinder Washington's uphill struggle for Arab support for a campaign to disarm Iraq.

In this context, Sharon agreed with Bush to work for the return of Palestinian revenue confiscated during the two-year-old Palestinian uprising.

Sharon's White House visit was aimed in part at smoothing rare friction between Israel and the United States over its military hammerlock on Palestinian cities and Palestinian civilian casualties incurred in occupation army raids on suspected Palestinian resistance activists.

PALESTINIAN OFFICIAL: PERES HOLDS TALKS WITH EREQAT

Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres met with a senior Palestinian delegation headed by chief negotiator Saeb Erakat in Jerusalem, a senior Palestinian official told AFP.

At the meeting, which took place at an unnamed location in west Jerusalem, Peres and Erekat discussed the humanitarian disaster facing the Palestinian people and the transfer of Palestinian funds frozen by Israel, the official said on condition of anonymity.

Another Israeli official who was not named was at the meeting, along with the Palestinian economy minister Maher al-Masri.
Among the subjects discussed were "an Israeli withdrawal from the Palestinian cities which have been reoccupied since September 28, 2000, the removal of the closure and the siege and the transfer of money owed to the Palestinian Authority," he said.

The two delegations also spoke about the "humanitarian disaster" facing the Palestinian people and the ongoing settlement activity in the Palestinian territories, he added.

EASE PALESTINIAN PLIGHT

Bush pressed Sharon to take steps to ease the humanitarian plight of Palestinians, whose livelihoods have been ruined by curfews and blockades imposed on West Bank towns in response to resistance attacks by resistance groups spearheading the uprising against occupation.

In a joint statement, Bush and Sharon agreed Israel would "consider favorably the gradual and scheduled transfer" of all Palestinian Authority (PA) tax funds collected by Israel as long as a U.S.-led monitoring effort ensured the money was used to help Palestinian civilians, not bankroll resistance groups.

Transfers of the customs and valued added tax receipts, amounting to dlrs 420 million, were suspended by Israel in a punitive measure at the start of the uprising.

Lack of funds, along with army curfews and closures, have crippled the Palestinian infrastructure.

Palestinian leaders say Israel's tight military grip on West Bank cities and its tank raids into Gaza neighborhoods that often lead to civilian casualties only deepen Palestinian bitterness and spur further violence by the resistance.

PALESTINIAN KILLED IN RAFAH, 15 OTHERS WOUNDED INCLUDING 9 CHILDREN

In the Gaza city of Rafah, a 53-year-old Palestinian man was killed and 15 people including children were wounded during a gunbattle with Palestinian resistance men. It broke out after Israeli occupation troops began reinforcing a fence around a base in a district abutting the border with Egypt.

Palestinian medics said the dead man, Ahmed Asfour, had been accompanying his 21-year-old daughter to buy gold jewelry for her wedding when he was hit by a bullet in the head. The young woman was unhurt.

SO-CALLED ROGUE SETTLERS EVACUATED

In the occupied West Bank on Wednesday, Jewish settlers evacuated a so-called rogue outpost after a short standoff with Israel's Defense Ministry, which wanted them out as an apparent gesture to Washington before the Bush-Sharon meeting.

The proliferation of Jewish settlements, built on West Bank and Gaza Strip lands occupied in the 1967 Middle East war, was among the main sparks of the Palestinian uprising against Israeli occupation launched two years ago.

The Palestinian resistance has designated internationally illegal settlements as legitimate targets and Palestinian resistance men have often targeted such settlements.

PHOTO CAPTION

A Schmartas, an Israeli product seen here at the new Safe America store, Tuesday, Oct. 16, 2002, is designed to protect children from nuclear, biological and chemical incidents. The suit has an air blower that assists youngsters in breathing as well as a hookup that permits a feeding bottle to be attached. It retails for 495. The Safer America store is schedule to open Thursday in Manhattan. (AP Photo/Stephen Chernin)
<