RAMALLAH, 25 March 2005 — Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qorei yesterday asked Washington to adopt a “clear and firm” policy against Jewish settlement activity in the West Bank with Israel vowing to expand existing communities.

“We want a clear and firm American position concerning the Israeli government’s plans to enlarge three settlement blocks in the West Bank and continue to build the wall,” Qorei’s office quoted him as saying.

The premier made the remarks in talks with US Assistant Secretary for Near Eastern Affairs David Welch and Deputy National Security Advisor Elliott Abrams in the West Bank city of Ramallah.

Qorei said the United States was aware of the “destructive threats” such plans pose to the road map, the two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the entire Middle East peace process.

In his own meeting with the same US officials on Wednesday, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said there is no question of freezing Israel’s planned expansion of Maale Adumim, the largest Jewish settlement in the West Bank. Welch and Abrams pressed Sharon for “clarifications” on the plan, a Sharon aide said. But Qorei said pussyfooting around was not enough.

“Contenting yourself with asking for clarifications from Israel on its activities without adopting a firm position... will encourage (Sharon) to take unilateral decisions over the West Bank,” he said.

Washington has called for an end to settlement activity in keeping with Israel’s commitments under the road map plan for peace but has stayed neutral on the latest plans to build up areas such as Maale Adumim.

Meanwhile, opponents of Israel’s plan to withdraw from Gaza desperately scrambled yesterday to win support for a referendum on the pullout as the government sailed toward victory at a crunch vote on the 2005 budget.

Opponents are battling to get Parliament to legislate a referendum and reject the budget next week, as these two moves are seen as the last two political opportunities to stall Sharon’s plans to begin disengaging from Gaza from July 20.

The budget is criticized by the left for its welfare cuts and seen as key to halting the evacuation by the right-wing. If it is not adopted by the end of the month the government would fall and the pullout be jeopardized.

Any plebiscite could seriously delay an evacuation already sanctioned by Parliament and the Cabinet.

Political machinations and manipulations over the referendum have seen tension soar in Sharon’s right-wing Likud party, a third of which oppose the Gaza withdrawal, in a standoff that has dogged the premier for months.

As things stand, the referendum bid is headed for failure. The mass-selling Yediot Aharonot daily predicted that 64 out of the 120 MPs are opposed, including 14 Likud deputies, with only 38 in favor, among them 26 Likud members.

But what could swing the vote against Sharon is the support of the 11 MPs from the ultra-Orthodox Shas party, which is deeply against the Gaza evacuation, but has traditionally opposed plebiscites on principle.