Bush pressure fails to stop the bloodshed in the Middle East

JERUSALEM - Further pressure from President Bush on Israel and Palestine failed to halt the violence in the Middle East yesterday.

Palestinian gunmen shot dead an Israeli motorist in the West Bank and gun battles erupted in the Gaza Strip, a day after Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon called for a ceasefire to end months of bloodshed.

Bush telephoned Sharon and Palestinian President Yasser Arafat to urge them to carry out the recommendations of the US-led George Mitchell committee to try to end the Palestinian uprising against Israeli occupation.

But Arafat implicitly rejected Sharon's call for a truce, and the fighting continued as a car was fired on near the Jewish settlement of Ariel in the West Bank.

An Israeli building contractor was killed and his security guard wounded.

An organisation calling itself the Palestinian Popular Army Front admitted responsibility. It said the attack was in retaliation for Israeli Army assassinations of Palestinians.

Sharon had called for a ceasefire on Wednesday in which he also rejected a total freeze of Jewish settlement activity on occupied Arab land, part of a plan by a committee chaired by Mitchell.

Arafat said after talks with French Premier Lionel Jospin that Sharon should accept the report in its entirety.

"This report has been accepted by the European Union, by the United States, by Arab countries, by Russia, by the Palestinians," he said.

The Mitchell report called for an immediate cessation of violence and then a cooling-off period followed by confidence-building measures, including a freeze on settlement construction.

Sharon said after talks with European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana that he wanted Arafat to call publicly for a ceasefire.

Palestinians want a ceasefire and a freeze on Jewish settlements to go hand-in-hand. Israel and US Secretary of State Colin Powell have said the sides must end the violence before taking steps to restore shattered trust.

Arafat called again for a Middle East summit to be convened as soon as possible, to establish a mechanism and a timetable for implementing the report's recommendations.

French diplomatic sources said they were exploring with both sides the possibility that Arafat could call a truce, followed rapidly by an Israeli announcement of a settlement freeze.

But they cautioned that prospects for such a sequence were uncertain.

Bush's direct telephone calls to Sharon and Arafat marked a new personal effort by the President to end the violence, which began last September after talks, led by Bush's predecessor, Bill Clinton, failed.

In the Gaza Strip, near the border with Egypt, Israeli soldiers and Palestinian gunmen waged a fierce battle.

Hospital officials said at least 38 Palestinians, including 15 children, had been wounded. Most were civilians.

- REUTERS

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