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Sharon Heads to U.S. for Talks on Mideast Truce
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon headed for the United States to shore up a tenuous Middle East cease-fire threatened by new violence, including another killing of a Palestinian militant in the West Bank.
Sharon holds talks on the U.S.-brokered truce on Tuesday with President Bush. His trip included a stop in London on Sunday to meet British Prime Minister Tony Blair.
In a new sign of the fragility of the truce, a powerful bomb blast in the West Bank on Sunday killed a Palestinian militant believed to be sought by Israel. Palestinian President Yasser Arafat's Fatah faction accused Israel of assassinating the man.
Osama Jawabreh was killed instantly when a bomb exploded as he used a public phone in the historic heart of Nablus.
The Al-Aqsa Brigades, an armed group linked to Fatah, said Jawabreh had been one of its militants. The group says it carried out a number of attacks on Israelis, most recently killing several Jewish settlers on roads near Nablus.
Israeli media said Jawabreh was believed to have made bombs used in several attacks in central and northern Israel.
There was no claim of responsibility for his death, but a senior official on Sharon's plane said Arafat had ignored an Israeli demand to arrest dozens of "terrorists" as part of the truce and warned Israel would act in "self-defense" if arrests were not made.
After his meeting in London, Sharon said he told Blair that "pressure should be increased on Arafat to prevent terror, because we can't achieve peace unless there is complete quiet."
Blair "emphasized that progress on security was important, not just of itself, but as a means of moving on to peace negotiations," a Downing Street spokesman said.
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