WASHINGTON/OCCUPIED JERUSALEM, 16 October 2003 — The United States Tuesday evinced no interest in an unofficial peace accord drawn up by Israeli and Palestinian politicians and intellectuals in Jordan over the weekend.

The State Department said Washington would continue to press Israel and Palestinian to move ahead with the nearly moribund US-backed “road map” for Middle East peace which it said was the best way to end the ongoing conflict.

The peace initiative was drafted under the supervision of British Prime Minister Tony Blair, the Palestinian newspaper Al-Quds reported yesterday. The daily said the main points of the so-called “Geneva” initiative were agreed upon during a meeting attended by Blair between Israeli and Palestinian delegations in February near London.

“Seventy five percent of the clauses in the initiative were drawn up during this meeting and the rest during the Dead Sea meeting” in Jordan on Oct. 12, the newspaper said without revealing its sources. The Israeli delegation was led by former Justice Minister Yossi Beilin and the Palestinian team by then Information Minister Yasser Abed Rabbo, the newspaper said.

But the US spokesman Richard Boucher noted pointedly that the alternate plan, which neither the Israeli nor Palestinian leadership is likely to adopt despite high hopes by its drafters, was unofficial. “It’s a Track 2 ...effort. It has no official status,” he said. “It’s really a private initiative and not something that we or any other officials were involved with.

“Our view is that we need to continue to pursue (US President George W. Bush’s) vision of two states, that the road map is the best way to move forward on that, and that continues to be where we put our emphasis,” Boucher said. “We’ve not been part of this, it is private, it’s separate. Our view is that the roadmap is the way forward and that’s what we’ll continue to work on.”

The alternative plan includes an acceptance by the Palestinians that Israel is a Jewish state and there could be no right of return for Palestinian refugees, according to reports.

It is also believed to provide for shared sovereignty on disputed areas of Jerusalem and gives the Palestinians 97.5 percent of the West Bank. In exchange, Palestinian refugees would have to waive their right of return to areas now incorporated in the state of Israel as it was founded in 1948.

However, an Israeli Foreign Ministry official said yesterday Israel’s government is angered by the Swiss sponsorship of the unofficial peace plan. Foreign Ministry spokesman Jonathan Peled said the government was peeved at the Swiss, who helped fund the effort and hosted participants for talks in Geneva.

“I’m not sure that we are furious with them but we are certainly checking to see what the Swiss involvement is,” Peled said. “We will explain to them that agreements and negotiations are conducted between governments and not private individuals.”

Funding for the “Geneva Accord” has also come from Britain, Japan, Norway and Sweden. Participants hope to sign the deal in Geneva on Nov. 4, the eighth anniversary of the assassination of Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin. An official at the Swiss Foreign Ministry defended the effort.

One newspaper poll published yesterday said nearly 40 percent of Israelis were in favor of the agreement, though about 70 percent said negotiations should not be conducted without government approval.