RIYADH, 27 February — Saudi newspapers yesterday dismissed Israel’s invitation to Crown Prince Abdullah, deputy premier and commander of the National Guard, to present his peace initiative in Jerusalem as a Zionist maneuver, while the Gulf press charged that Israel was seeking to reduce the peace overture to a proposal to normalize ties with the Jewish state.

“The Israelis, deeply embarrassed by the crown prince’s initiative and the unprecedented support it has won ... are trying to embarrass others and throw the ball out of their court,” a Saudi newspaper wrote.

The invitation was “a maneuver by the Israeli president,” said Al-Watan daily.

Israeli President Moshe Katsav on Monday invited Prince Abdullah to occupied Jerusalem, offering to alternatively visit Riyadh, to discuss his Mideast peace initiative.

“Such cheap one-upmanship will not impress anyone because Saudi Arabia is not the kind to go it alone,” Al-Watan retorted.

Exchanges of visits between the Saudis and Israelis can only take place “to consolidate accords that have already been concluded, not at the outset of an initiative on which the Israelis have yet to take a clear stand,” it said.

Moreover, Al-Watan said, it is the Arab summit slated for March 27-28 in Beirut that “will decide the fate of this initiative, since it concerns all Arab countries, which must endorse it” and promote it as a joint plan.

In its banner headline, the newspaper Al-Riyadh charged that Katsav was seeking to forge ties with Saudi Arabia without committing to peace.

“Prince Abdullah’s initiative reflects a quest to implement UN resolutions and ... facilitate a peace agreement,” the daily said.

“The onus is on the United States to analyze the content of the initiative, not only because it came from the biggest Arab state in economic and spiritual terms, but also because of the sincerity of the overture and (Riyadh’s) capacity to muster Arab and Islamic support for it,” Al-Riyadh said.

Al-Yawm concurred, saying Washington should back the initiative by virtue of its “full partnershhip” in the Middle East peace process.

“The US administration, which is a full partner in the peace process, must back the Saudi plan aimed at ending the conflict in the region,” it said.

Israeli leaders “are seeking to empty the Saudi initiative of its substance ... and turn it into a prelude to normalization of ties between the two countries,” wrote Qatar’s Al-Sharq.

“True to its diplomatic record of deceit, Israel wants to obtain full normalization while procrastinating on withdrawal” from occupied Arab lands, said Al-Watan, another Qatari daily.

Israel seems to be trying to “snatch the initiative from the Arabs and turn it into a normalization proposal,” said Al-Raya, which is also published in Doha. The Israelis are also seeking to “strip the initiative of its Arab dimension,” the newspaper said.

In the United Arab Emirates, the Abu Dhabi-based Al-Ittihad cautioned the Arabs against Israel’s “equivocations, tricks and traps.”

Al-Khaleej, another Emirati newspaper, warned that Katsav’s invitation to Abdullah was a trap laid ahead of the Beirut summit.

Both the United States and Israel were trying to “empty the initiative of its content and reduce it to a mere normalization of Arab ties” with the Jewish state, the paper said.

“Had the United States intended to deal positively with Crown Prince Abdullah’s initiative, it would have ... ordered (Israel) to lift the blockade imposed on the Palestinian president (Yasser Arafat) and the Palestinian people,” Al-Khaleej added.

Abdullah said in The New York Times last week that Riyadh favored Arab states normalizing relations with Israel if it carried out a full withdrawal from the territories captured in the 1967 Middle East war.

He said he had written a speech along those lines to deliver to the upcoming Arab summit, but shelved it due to Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s hard line against the Palestinians as the Middle East crisis slid deeper into violence.

“Let me say to you that the speech is written, and it is still in my drawer,” Abdullah told the Times correspondent when asked whether he would be prepared to revive the proposal if Sharon and the Palestinians were to agree to a cease-fire before the Beirut summit.

The United States said on Monday it considered Abdullah’s initiative an “important step” toward Middle East peace, but added that it needed further details before taking a definite position on the overture.

US Secretary of State Colin Powell said he had called Prince Abdullah on Sunday to thank him for the proposal.