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Israel on High Alert Ahead of Jewish New Year
Israel has deployed thousands of policemen and soldiers for preventing possible terrorist attacks ahead of the Jewish New Year which will fall on Tuesday.
Israeli police sources said that following last Tuesday's terrorist attacks in the United States, the Palestinians are estimated to refrain from attacking Israeli targets, but the estimation has proven "wrong."
Israeli Defense Minister Binyamin Ben Eliezer said Sunday night that according to intelligence sources, there have been " indications" that Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat has ordered all the uniformed Palestinian security forces to cease fire.
He also reported that prior to Sunday evening, there had been indeed a drop in the number of shooting incidents.
However, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said in an interview with Israel Radio on Monday that he has yet to receive clear indications from Arafat that he has issued a ceasefire order to forces under his control.
"I don't yet have any clear announcement, and apart from that, what's important will be the result" of such a declaration, if the Palestinian leader issues one," he told the radio.
"There were, in fact, a few quieter hours during the day (Sunday), but towards the evening the fire increased," said Sharon, adding that "there were mortar fires and explosives. The entire front is not quiet."
Sharon promised Sunday that if Arafat announced a ceasefire, Israel would stop its "initiated operations" in Palestinian areas, and if the ceasefire holds for 48 hours, he would allow his Foreign Minister Shimon Peres to meet with Arafat to discuss next steps for a total ceasefire.
The United States is reportedly pressuring Sharon to allow Peres to meet with Arafat. And U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell held telephone talks with Sharon overnight in this regard.
The hawkish prime minister denied on Monday that Powell had exerted such pressures, saying that "he hasn't put any pressure on me, not now and not in the past."
Instead, Sharon revealed that the U.S. administration was applying pressure on Arafat to call a ceasefire.
The nearly one year Israeli-Palestinian violence has so far killed more than 800 people, most of them Palestinians.
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