Both sides in the Mideast crisis agree to talks but still at loggerheads

JERUSALEM - Israelis and Palestinians are keeping expectations low ahead of a summit with United States President Bill Clinton in Egypt meant to end 17 days of bloodshed.

Officials on both sides made clear at the weekend that the talks tomorrow between Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak and Palestinian President Yasser Arafat may not bring an end to the unrest and are unlikely to lead to a renewal of peacemaking.

"We have to keep our wits about us and not come with great expectations," Israel's cabinet secretary Yitzhak Herzog said.

Senior Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said Arafat would again demand an international committee look into the events of the past few weeks - a condition that caused the collapse of a summit in Paris on October 4.

"I honestly don't want to raise anyone's expectations and I don't have high expectations myself," he told CNN television.

"I think the situation is going to be very, very, very complex. I think the situation is going to be nightmarish."

Clinton praised the sides for agreeing to meet, in the Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh, after 99 people have died in the clashes, all but seven of them Arabs. But he made clear progress would be tough.

"Now we should be under no illusions. The good news is the parties have agreed to meet and the situation appears to be calmer," a weary-looking Clinton saidin Washington.

"But the path ahead is difficult. After the terrible events of the past few days, the situation is still quite tense."

The United States has vowed that a suicide attack on a US ship in the Yemeni port of Aden on Thursday that killed 17 sailors would not stop it trying to broker a Middle East peace accord.

Clinton said the goal of the summit - the result of five days of mediation by United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan - was to stop the violence, agree on a "fact-finding mechanism" to look into what caused the unrest and to get back on the peace track.

Palestinians staged scattered protests throughout the West Bank and Gaza Strip yesterday but there were no casualties despite stone-throwing and gunfire - one of the few times no one had been killed in such incidents since violence erupted.

Clashes flared on September 28 following a visit by Israeli right-winger Ariel Sharon to a site in Jerusalem holy to Muslims and Jews. Much of the world, including US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, blamed the Likud leader for the bloodshed.

But Barak has held talks throughout the week - the latest yesterday - to include the hawk, reviled by Arabs since leading Israel's 1982 invasion of Lebanon, in his Government.

An Israeli inquiry found Sharon indirectly responsible for a massacre of Palestinian refugees by Israel's Christian militia allies at the Sabra and Shatila camps outside Beirut.

"Above anything else now the question is up to Mr Barak. He has to choose. Either us, the moderates, will be his partners, or Sharon. He cannot have both," Erekat said.

"I think Sharon is the kiss of death to the peace process."

Israelis and Palestinians have blamed each other for the fierce fighting, the worst in decades.

Each demanded the other bring an end to the bloodshed, which has included such gory scenes as a 12-year-old Palestinian boy shot dead in his father's arms and the murder of two Israeli soldiers by a mob of Palestinians.

"Our security must be protected," Erekat said.

"We want an insurance this time ... that Israel will never repeat what it did in the missiles and the tanks and the choppers," he said, referring to an Israeli missile attack on Palestinian cities in retaliation for the brutal killing of the soldiers.

Herzog said Palestinians had repeatedly violated international agreements in the past few weeks and that Israel wanted guarantees that Palestinian police would never again turn their weapons on Israeli citizens and soldiers.

"From now on it has to be clear that being good neighbours is no joke and violating agreements is not a routine and that violence is not a negotiating tool."

- REUTERS

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