Peres asks US to push ceasefire

WASHINGTON - Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres says Israel wants the United States to arrange an Israeli-Palestinian ceasefire as a step toward negotiations to end seven months of bloodshed.

Peres made the comments after a meeting with Secretary of State Colin Powell yesterday, and followed an attack by Israeli tanks and bulldozers on a Gaza refugee camp on Wednesday, in which homes were demolished, a Palestinian gunman was killed and 14 people wounded.

After his talks with Powell, Peres said the ceasefire was something only the US could bring about.

"The United States is doing it, bringing the commanders of the two sides to bring an end to violence and impress on the Palestinians that without an end to the violence, there cannot be a start to the negotiations."

The CIA has been organising security cooperation meetings between Israeli and Palestinian officials for three weeks, so far with only limited success.

"Once violence will be stopped and negotiations will be started, then we suggest that negotiations will be face-to-face by the two parties, with the United States as a facilitator, not as a negotiator," said Peres, a former Israeli prime minister.

The Israeli Army said troops moved in to Gaza on Wednesday to destroy buildings that Palestinian gunmen had used as cover to fire at soldiers and as bases for planting roadside bombs.

Troops covered what the Army called the "operational engineering activities" of the bulldozers with tank and automatic fire as Palestinians fought back with grenade launchers and automatic weapons during the four-hour raid. Three children were among the wounded.

Israel handed back much of the Gaza Strip to Palestinian rule in 1994 under the 1993 Oslo interim peace accords, but held on to a chunk to accommodate some 7000 Jewish settlers who live next to a Palestinian population of 1.2 million.

It captured the strip, then administered by Egypt, in the 1967 Middle East war. Settlements on occupied land are illegal.

The Palestinian Authority denounced what it called a "planned aggression" that threatened regional stability.

"We continue to demand international protection for the Palestinian people exposed to the ugliest forms of aggression," a spokesman said.

State Department spokesman Philip Reeker said such incursions into Palestinian territory "undermine efforts to defuse the situation and bring an end to the violence and escalation."

"We've also made very clear to the Palestinians that they must carry out their responsibility to break the cycle of violence as well, and prevent continued provocative acts of violence emanating from areas under their control."

Powell, standing beside Peres outside the State Department, described Peres' contacts with Egypt, Jordan and the Palestinians as the beginning of a dialogue.

"But you can't move in that direction until we really see the violence go down and until I think economic activity gets started up again between the two sides."

The Israeli Government has agreed to look at an Egyptian-Jordanian initiative that calls for an end to bloodshed, confidence-building measures and the resumption of Israeli-Palestinian peace talks.

A key element of the plan, endorsed by Palestinian leaders, is a halt to construction in Jewish settlements in the West Bank and Gaza Strip as one of several confidence-building measures.

Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, reiterating his demand for a complete halt to Palestinian violence, rejected the idea of halting the expansion of settlements.

- REUTERS

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