Abbas win and new Sharon coalition boost peace hopes

RAMALLAH, WEST BANK - Middle East peace hopes were boosted on Monday local time when Mahmoud Abbas was elected Palestinian president and the Israeli parliament endorsed Ariel Sharon's new coalition to implement his planned Gaza pull-out.

But parliament approved Sharon's unity government by only 58 votes to 56, showing deep divisions remain over the pull-out plan and that the prime minister still faces tough opposition.

Abbas, who wants to resume peace talks with Israel, won 62.3 per cent of the vote in Sunday's election to succeed Yasser Arafat, icon of the Palestinian fight for a state, but militants still defy his calls to end attacks on the Jewish state.

Sharon said on Monday peacemaking must start with a crackdown on militants, while Abbas told a group of foreign election observers: "We are ready to make peace based on justice and we hope that the response will be positive."

After years of shunning Arafat who died in November, US President George W Bush invited Abbas to the White House and pledged his help.

Bush urged Abbas to bolster security forces to take on militants but also called on Israel to assist the new Palestianian leadership.

"It is essential that Israel keep a vision of two states living side by side in peace, and that as the Palestinians begin to develop the institutions of a state, that (Israelis) support the development of those institutions," said Bush.

Abbas' victory margin was at the top end of expectations but with the Electoral Commission declining to give a final turnout figure, due to doubts over the number of eligible voters, the real strength of the mandate was difficult to gauge.

Militants, including the Islamic movement Hamas, boycotted the election. In addition, neither Palestinians nor Israelis have shown signs of compromise on fundamental issues behind decades of conflict.

As well as seeking peace, Abbas has promised to battle widespread corruption and revive the crumbling Palestinian Authority, reversing the legacy of years of debilitating violence and chaotic rule before Arafat's death.

"A moderate man was elected, an intelligent man, an experienced man," said Shimon Peres, a veteran Israeli peacemaker who was sworn in as a deputy to Sharon in the new coalition. "Let's give him a chance," Peres said.

Israel has said it sees Abbas as a man to do business with and has praised his calls for an end to violence in the four-year-old Palestinian uprising. But it has criticised his intention to co-opt rather than confront militants.

"The Palestinians are still not fighting terror and while his declarations in the framework of the election campaign were encouraging, he will be tested by the way he battles terror and acts to dismantle its infrastructure," Sharon said.

Sharon has offered to resume security cooperation with the Palestinians and co-ordinate aspects of his plan to quit the Gaza Strip and parts of the West Bank this year, for the first time uprooting settlements from land where Palestinians seek a state.

The initiative, hailed by Western countries as a possible step to peace, gained vital momentum on Monday with the Israeli parliament's approval of the new coalition government, led by Sharon but with Peres' centre-left Labour Party a main partner.

It restores Sharon's parliamentary majority for the first time in six months and will help him pursue the pullout despite hardliners, including rebels in his right-wing Likud party who oppose ceding land captured in the 1967 Middle East war.

Israeli officials have said Sharon, who accused Arafat of fomenting violence and shunned him for years, will seek a meeting with Abbas within days. But Abbas aides said he wanted assurances that it would be more than a photo opportunity.

- REUTERS