RAMALLAH, West Bank, 10 June 2004 — A Palestinian official said Yasser Arafat protested to Amman yesterday about the reported participation of Jordanian officers in Israeli Army patrols on the West Bank, but Jordan denied the report.
“Arafat received information, two weeks ago, that high-ranking Jordanian officers visited (Israeli) positions on the west bank of the Jordan River with Israeli Army officers,” the Palestinian official said, on condition of anonymity.
He said that the Palestinian leader had then asked his Foreign Affairs Minister Nabil Shaath to make inquiries to the Jordanian government.
The official said joint patrols in that West Bank region, occupied by Israel after the 1967 war, occurred again a few days after the initial inquiry and that Arafat had sent Palestinian Interior Minister Hakam Balawi to the Jordanian capital with “a message of protest and asking for explanations.”
There was no immediate information about the results of the Palestinian queries to Jordan, whose government said no protest had been received.
“This information is baseless. It is not true,” government spokeswoman Asma Khodr told AFP. She said the report about the participation of Jordanian officers in Israeli Army patrols on the West Bank was baseless.
An Israeli Army spokesman told AFP he was not aware of any joint-patrols on the West Bank but would look into the claims. Khodr insisted on Monday that Jordan was ready to train Palestinian security services but would not deploy any of its troops on the West Bank. “There won’t be any Jordanian military presence on the West Bank but if the (Palestinian) Authority requests it Jordan is not opposed to offering training,” in the field of security, Khodr said.
In Al-Zawiyah, Israeli troops wounded an elderly Palestinian man when they fired tear gas and rubber bullets against villagers protesting the construction of Israel’s West Bank wall, witnesses and medical sources said.
Shaqur Muqadi, 70, was hit in the head with a rubber bullet during the protest by 800 people, including foreigners, in the village of Al-Zawiyah in the northern West Bank, the sources said.
Around a dozen protestors fainted after inhaling tear gas. Villagers here have been protesting since Monday to try to prevent a new stretch of the wall from being built on their land. Israel is building the separation wall along the West Bank to prevent infiltrations by would-be suicide bombers.
But Palestinians say the barrier, which often juts deep into their territory, is a mere land-grab and pre-empts the borders of their promised state. Several affected communities have staged protests against the barrier, some resulting in fatal injuries.
A Hamas member was shot dead by Israeli troops in the northern Gaza Strip.
In another development, Israeli officials said yesterday the attorney-general will issue a decision next week on whether to indict Prime Minister Ariel Sharon in a long-running corruption scandal.
Sharon could be forced from office if indicted, which would probably derail his landmark Gaza withdrawal plan. But Israeli media reported in May that Attorney-General Menachem Mazuz was leaning against charging Sharon, who denies any wrongdoing.
A Justice Ministry spokeswoman said Mazuz would submit his official recommendation “toward the 15th of the month”.
The case centers on payments of hundreds of thousands of dollars that an Israeli land developer was alleged to have made to Sharon’s son Gilad, whom he hired in the late 1990s as an adviser on a never-completed project to build a Greek resort. The real estate developer, David Appel, is a stalwart of Sharon’s ruling Likud party.
He was indicted in January on charges of trying to bribe Sharon. Israel’s chief prosecutor has officially recommended indicting the prime minister as well.
Sharon also faces investigation for possible criminal charges in two other corruption scandals. He has denied any misconduct.
Meanwhile, an Arab-Israeli soldier went on trial yesterday charged with manslaughter in the shooting death of British peace activist Tom Hurndall in the Gaza Strip last year.
Sgt. Wahid Taysir, a Bedouin scout whose identity was initially withheld by military censors, is said to have admitted firing in the direction of an unarmed civilian after first claiming that Hurndall shot at him with a handgun.
