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| By: Israel Insider staff and partners |
| Published: March 15, 2006 |
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Israel restored direct contacts with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas for the first time since the militant Islamic Hamas won January elections, with a secret meeting in Jordan between elder statesman Shimon Peres and Abbas.
Acting Prime Minister Ehud Olmert approved the meeting, Olmert's office said on Monday, though Olmert had said he would not see Abbas himself because of the impending Hamas takeover of the Palestinian government and banned meetings with Abbas without his approval.
Olmert's office said the topics of the meeting were economic. Abbas aide Nabil Abu Rdeneh gave the same description in a phone call from Vienna, where Abbas is holding talks.
The secret talks between Abbas and Peres, a key Olmert ally in the new Kadima Party, came just two weeks before Israel's election. Kadima holds a wide lead, but Olmert has been taking steps to stem a small but steady drop in support.
The Peres-Abbas meeting apparently was meant to attract the support of moderate voters. Peres is a former leader of the dovish Labor Party and an architect of interim peace deals with the Palestinians.
Olmert breathed life into a sleepy election campaign over the weekend when he spelled out his plans for Judea and Samaria - saying he would withdraw from significant parts and move settlers from outlying locations into settlement blocs Israel would keep. He said he preferred peace negotiations, but with Hamas in control of the Palestinian government, he was prepared to move unilaterally.
Likud leader Benjamin Netanyahu said Olmert has transformed the election into a referendum on the future of Judea and Samaria.
Peres and other doves have insisted that despite the Hamas victory, Israel must maintain contact with Abbas, head of the Fatah Party defeated by Hamas in the parliamentary vote.
Abbas was elected president of the Palestinian Authority in January 2005 and has three years left to serve, regardless of the makeup of the parliament or Cabinet.
Abbas has said he might retain control of contacts with Israel, while Hamas handles internal issues. However, Israel and Abbas have not fared well in the past. Israel charged that Abbas did not crack down on violent groups as required by the internationally backed "road map" peace plan.
Abbas complained that the Israelis were taking no steps to boost his regime; instead, adding obstacles like West Bank roadblocks and settlement construction.
Israel has begun construction of a police station between the suburb of Maaleh Adumim and Jerusalem, about nine kilometers (five miles) away, an Israeli official confirmed Monday. The police station is seen as the first step toward implementing a plan to build 3,500 housing units to link the settlement, Israel's largest, to Jerusalem.
Palestinians and the U.S. strongly oppose the project. U.S. Embassy spokesman Stewart Tuttle had no comment about the police station bur repeated U.S. objections to expanding Israeli settlements in Judea and Samaria.
In Gaza, Hamas negotiators met through the day Monday with leaders of other Palestinian factions. Hamas has until the end of the month to form a government. Since it has an absolute majority in the parliament, it could go it alone, but incoming Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh has said he wants as broad a government as possible, even including Fatah.
However, its platform is likely to keep Fatah on the sidelines. Hamas officials have said they favor continued "resistance" to Israeli occupation as a legitimate right, refusing to renounce violence, and they also decline to endorse the interim peace accords with Israel, signed by Fatah.
Israel has already cut off transfer of tens of millions of dollars a month in taxes and customs, and Western donors are weighing the dilemma of trying to alleviate poverty among the Palestinian people without financing Hamas. Israel, the U.S. and European Union list Hamas as a terror group because it has sent dozens of suicide bombers into Israel - though none in the past year during a cease-fire.
AP contributed to this report. |
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