JERUSALEM (Islamweb & News Agencies) - New Israeli violence has further dimmed success prospects of the current Anthony Zinni ceasefire mission in the region. However the US envoy was to resume security talks with Israeli and Palestinian officials on Sunday to achieve an elusive Middle East truce ahead of a key Arab summit in Beirut later this week.
Officials from both sides said the cease-fire talks to end 18 months of bloodshed, which ended without results on Friday, would forge ahead on Sunday.
But Zinni's efforts were marred on Saturday by new Israeli violence in the Gaza Strip in which occupation troops killed five Palestinians, two of them Resistance men who stormed an army post.
Aides to Yasser Arafat meanwhile, said the Palestinian president was already planning to head to the March 27-28 summit, a trip that would end his three-month-old confinement in the West Bank imposed by Israel after a wave of Palestinian attacks.
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has said Arafat can attend the summit only if he implements a truce. The United States has also held out the possibility of a high-level meeting with Arafat if a cease-fire is forged.
In Ramallah, Palestinian officials said Arafat planned to go to the summit in what would be his first trip since Israeli tanks bottled him up in his West Bank compound in December.
A senior Palestinian official who asked not to be identified said Arafat would make a stopover in Cairo to see Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak before flying on to Beirut. Egyptian officials had no immediate comment on Mubarak's plans.
PHOTO CAPTION:
A Palestinian man argues with an Israeli occupation soldier as he tries to cross the Qalandia checkpoint between Jerusalem and the West Bank city of Ramallah, March 23, 2002. The U.S. pressed on with a drive to end 18 months of Middle East violence, holding out the prospect of a high-level meeting with Yasser Arafat if Palestinian attacks against Israelis stopped. Photo by Ammar Awad/Reuters