OCCUPIED JERUSALEM, 13 July 2003 — Israel could deport or arrest Palestinian President Yasser Arafat if he holds up his prime minister’s efforts to implement a US-backed road map to Middle East peace, sources close to Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said yesterday.
“Israel conveyed to Washington that if Arafat continues to undermine Abu Mazen, we will reconsider his location and status,” a source said, using Palestinian Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas’ nom de guerre. “By status we mean immunity.”
Abbas, a moderate and reformer, became prime minister earlier this year following pressure from the United States, which has sidelined Arafat, accusing him of fomenting violence in a 33-month-old Palestinian uprising. He denies it.
Palestinian officials say Arafat is trying to weaken Abbas, viewing him as too soft on Israel when it comes to implementing reciprocal measures required by the road map en route to Palestinian statehood in the West Bank and Gaza Strip by 2005.
On June 29, Abbas coaxed a temporary truce out of militant groups spearheading the uprising. Israeli troops withdrew from the West Bank city of Bethlehem and areas of Gaza in security handovers that have proven largely successful.
But tensions still simmer over 6,000 Palestinians arrested in roundups and anti-militant swoops. Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has said several hundred “minor offenders” could be freed — not enough to satisfy Palestinian demands.
In the southern Gaza Strip town of Rafah, 45 children of Palestinian prisoners launched a hunger strike to pressure Abbas to win their parents’ release.
The children are aged between 10 and 15. “We call on Abu Mazen to not forget my father. I will go hungry until the people of the world remember my father and our parents,” Randa Qishda, 14, told Reuters.
The release of prisoners is crucial to Palestinians who see it as key in any peace process. Palestinian officials say Abbas’ credibility is at stake, and some see a deliberate design by Israel’s hawkish government.
“Sharon is working on obstructing the road map,” Arafat told reporters in the West Bank city of Ramallah, where he has been blockaded by Israel after waves of bombings last year.
Israeli officials have in the past said deporting, arresting or even killing Arafat were viable options.
A top Palestinian official said the Arafat-Abbas fracas could be solved with a shakeup of the Fatah national movement at whose helm both men have stood for decades.
The Palestinian Cabinet called on the international community to continue dealing with Arafat and said it would pursue prisoner releases.
Though not part of the road map, the issue is likely to be raised during Sharon’s visit to Washington, which was moved forward from September and an Israeli official said was now expected to take place in the last week of July.
Palestinians also seek further Israeli withdrawals in the West Bank. Sharon has demanded that Abbas begin to dismantle militant groups first, but a top Palestinian official said no crackdown was needed.
“Until now we have done 90 percent of the work through internal dialogue. We are pursuing the other 10 percent and will convince them (militants) of the value of our vision,” Minister for Security Affairs Mohammed Dahlan said. Sharon is to meet British Prime Minister Tony Blair in London tomorrow. Blair has been active in Middle East peacemaking — including with Syria, which yesterday said it was willing to restart negotiations which broke down in 2000.
Meanwhile, two Palestinians were injured by Israeli gunfire and three others were captured in separate incidents in the Gaza Strip yesterday, security sources said. A woman, 23-year-old Fawziyya Abu Mussaed, was injured in the leg when Israeli soldiers opened fire in Gush Katif.
