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Arafat Holds Talks With Mubarak After Three-way Summit Off
Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat arrived in Cairo Thursday morning for talks with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak after the cancellation of a crucial three-way summit that should have also involved Israeli caretaker Prime Minister Ehud Barak.
A Mubarak-Arafat-Barak summit had been planned for Thursday afternoon at Egyptian Red Sea resort of Sharm el Sheikh to mainly discuss a US compromise plan for a peace accord between Palestinians and Israel before US President Bill Clinton leaves office on January 20.
But the tripartite summit was announced to be called off in the small hours Thursday morning. An Egyptian official had said that the cancellation came after Barak decided not to come.
The compromise plan was put forward by Clinton last week to the Palestinian and Israeli negotiators who conducted five-day talks separately with U.S. officials in the context of ongoing Palestinian-Israeli clashes and imminent Israeli prime ministerial elections.
The Washington talks was regarded as the start of Clinton's tight timetable to squeeze a Palestinian-Israeli peace accord before he leaves the White House.
According to media reports, the proposal stipulates that Palestinians will gain sovereignty over the Arab neighborhoods and the Al Aqsa Mosque compound in East Jerusalem while the Wailing Wall, Judaism's holiest site, will remain under Israeli control.
In return, there would be no right of return for the some 3.7 million Palestinian refugees displaced since the 1948 Arab-Israeli war, with only a small number allowed back to Israel for family reunification.��
In addition, Israel would withdraw from 95 percent of the West Bank and 100 percent of the Gaza Strip, territories it has occupied along with East Jerusalem since the 1967 Arab-Israeli war.
Palestinians and Israel should have given their final decision on the compromise peace plan to Clinton by Wednesday, but the deadline was put off to the weekend after the sides asked for more time for discussions and consultations.
Palestinians have expressed deep reservations over the plan, saying that it failed to meet the minimum Palestinian requirements. A Palestinian official has said that the Palestinian leadership had sent a letter to the Clinton Administration that amounted to rejection to the compromise plan.
Israel security cabinet at a late-night session Wednesday accepted the U.S. proposals as the basis for renewing "intensive negotiations for a permanent agreement between Israel and the Palestinians, if they accepted as is by the other side as a basis for discussion."
To further throw the peace efforts into disarray, Barak's security advisor Danny Yatom said Thursday that Barak will not sign any agreement with Palestinians transferring the sovereignty of Al Aqsa Mosque compound to the Palestinians.
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