GAZA CITY, 30 January 2005 — Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon will hold their first summit in the second week of February.
Israeli Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz and Mohammed Dahlan, a top Palestinian security official, will meet to help prepare for the summit, Palestinian officials said. Their talks are expected to focus on an Israeli military pullback from five West Bank cities.
“This meeting (the summit) should take place a fortnight from now,” said Prime Minister Ahmed Qorei’s top aide Hassan Abu Libdeh. One Palestinian official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the meeting would take place on Feb. 8.
Abbas met Sharon when he was prime minister in 2003 but the proposed summit would be the first between Israeli and Palestinian leaders in over four years. Backed by his top allies in Washington, Sharon refused to have anything to do with Abbas’ late predecessor, Yasser Arafat.
But in a major policy shift, Israel has called off offensive operations in the Gaza Strip after 2,000 Palestinian troops were deployed in the south and center of the territory with orders to halt rocket attacks.
“This is a far-reaching step on our part, the biggest gesture since the start of the intifada, in the hope we might be able to turn a new page with the Palestinians,” Israeli government spokesman Avi Pazner said Friday.
The summit would cap a series of recent steps by Israel and the Palestinians to end more than four years of fighting and resume peace talks. Differences over the agenda remain, however, raising questions about what will come out of the meeting.
Dahlan and Mofaz will discuss a possible halt to Israeli military operations in the West Bank and the release of some of the 8,000 Palestinians jailed in Israel, amid reports that officials are ready to free a first group of 900.
“In case Israel agrees to Palestinian demands for a halt to targeted killings, incursions and agree to release Palestinian prisoners Abbas will head to Gaza Strip to discuss the truce with Palestinian factions,” Palestinian sources said.
Abbas, on his first foreign trip as leader, briefed Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak yesterday on efforts to secure a formal truce from Palestinian groups to cement a recent informal lull in violence. His order that Palestinian forces stop attacks across Gaza led even Sharon to hail a possible “historic breakthrough” in relations.
