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Barak: Too Early to Discuss New Summit With Palestinians
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak said Monday that it is premature to discuss a new summit with the Palestinians.
In reaction to earlier remarks by Palestinian National Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat who said another summit with Israel and the United States could take place later this month, the prime minister's office said it was not clear whether the Palestinians are ready for a breakthrough and there are no signs yet of concessions on the part of the Palestinians.
Arafat told the official Wam News Agency of the United Arab Emirates that U.S. President Bill Clinton has talked about another summit being held after the Democratic Convention next week in Los Angeles, Israel Radio reported.
Palestinian chief negotiator Saeb Erekat has confirmed that Clinton has discussed the possibility of a second summit with him at Camp David when the Israelis and Palestinians were trying to clinch a peace accord under the mediation of the United States.
Erekat also told Israel Radio that he was shocked by the fact that neither Barak nor the Israeli cabinet has publicly condemned Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, the spiritual leader of the ultra-Orthodox Shas party, of calling the Palestinians snakes.
Rabbi Yosef criticized Barak for racing to make peace with "snakes" on a Saturday night sermon broadcast on Shas' radio station network.
He also called the six million Jews who perished in the Holocaust during the Second World War as reincarnated sinners. His remarks on the Holocaust victims provoked angry responses among the Israelis.
Erekat said the rabbi's comment would have implications on the interface relations between the Israelis and Palestinians. He also said the entire region is endangered by the growing extremism in the Israeli establishment, according to the radio report.
The report also quoted Palestinian officials as saying that the interim agreement negotiations between the two sides are to continue next week. The interim issues include those such as the final redeployment of Israeli forces on the West Bank and the release of Palestinian prisoners jailed in Israeli prisons, totaling about 1,600.
In another development, Palestinian Minister for Jerusalem Affairs Faisal Husseini has said that the Palestinians recognize the interests of the Jewish people in the Holy City.
In a commentary published on the International Herald Tribune on Monday, Husseini said that the Palestinians seek to share the city as part of a peace deal with the Israelis. He noted that the Palestinians do not seek to divide the city of Jerusalem as it is already divided.
US President Bill Clinton sponsored the July 11-25 Camp David summit to help Israelis and Palestinians hammer out a peace deal to settle the final status issues such as the status of Jerusalem, border, water resources, the future of Jewish settlements and Palestinian refugees.
The summit collapsed due to unbridgeable differences on both sides, particularly on the thorniest issues of Jerusalem and the return of Palestinian refugees.
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