The explosion of Palestinian resistance to the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza that led to three days of street battles has subsided for the moment. But tensions remain high. The fighting, which broke out in late September in response to an attack by Israeli troops on Palestinian protesters, was unprecedented since the 1967 Arab-Israeli war.

A two-day summit between Yasir Arafat, head of the Palestinian Authority, and Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu was sponsored by the Clinton administration in Washington, D.C., October 1-2. Subsequent talks between Tel Aviv and representatives of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) began October 7 at the Erez checkpoint on the border between Gaza and Israel. These negotiations have stalemated.

PLO official Hassan Asfour said Palestinian negotiators walked out of the talks after Israeli officials demanded military control throughout the West Bank city of Hebron. They were convinced to return by Dennis Ross, the Clinton administration's Middle East coordinator. "They [Israeli officials] want to totally change the agreement, and we told them that on principal we won't discuss it," Asfour said. Under a 1993 agreement reached in Oslo, Norway, Israeli troops were to have left Hebron six months ago.

"Until now, the talks are not as positive as we expected," said Arafat. In a meeting at the home of Israeli president Ezer Weizman in Caaesarea, he pledged that Palestinian police will not open fire on Israeli soldiers again. "This is my permanent orders for our policemen, because what is important is to strengthen more and more the relations and coordination between both of us," said Arafat.

Netanyahu, with backing from Washington, demanded "adjustments" as negotiators for the Zionist regime continue to balk at the withdrawal of Israeli troops from Hebron. According to the New York Times, Netanyahu's proposals would delay withdrawals or transfers of land until at least 1999.

Yitzhak Mordechai, Tel Aviv's defense minister, stated a "new situation" was created by the armed response of the Palestinian police to the Israeli assault on peaceful demonstrators. "We don't ask to change the agreement. We just ask to have a different understanding of the agreement," he told the Washington Post.

Mordechai said Tel Aviv demands the accords be "understood" to:

1) Allow Israeli troops in Hebron to storm into Palestinian- controlled areas of the town whenever the Zionist occupation forces deem necessary. Palestinian negotiator Asfour stated the Israeli military wants to reserve the right to pursue Palestinians anywhere in the West Bank and Gaza.

2) Bar Palestinian police from carrying their AK-47 assault rifles in some Palestinian-controlled areas, which would mean that Israeli soldiers and armed settlers would not have to confront equally armed Palestinian forces. Tel Aviv is seeking to restrict the Palestinian police weapons to sidearms.

3) Permit Israeli officials veto rights over construction plans of Palestinians near Israeli buildings in order to prevent Palestinians from erecting high buildings or military positions overlooking Israeli settlements and neighborhoods. The Zionist occupiers are also pressing to set up look-out posts over Arab neighborhoods and buffer zones separating Israeli soldiers and settlers from Palestinian police.

According to the Financial Times of London, Israeli infrastructure minister Ariel Sharon and interior minister Eli Suissa "have spelt out their intention to complete a wall of Jewish settlements to cut east Jerusalem off from the West Bank."

Tel Aviv has also demanded that the Palestinian Authority dismiss and prosecute the Palestinian policemen involved in the gun battles and disarm Palestinians who have unregistered weapons. Israeli Radio reported that the Israeli military has set up a checkpoint near the West Bank town of Nablus and is checking identification papers in search for Palestinian policemen who were involved in the gun battles.

Meanwhile, some 2 million Palestinians are still living under a state of siege within their local "autonomous areas" with "Israeli tanks ringing the main cities and helicopter gunships at the ready," the Economist reported. The armored vehicles have severed links between 450 towns and communities in the West Bank and Gaza, while the Israeli military has blocked off dozens of roads leading into Israel with concrete barricades.

The Palestinian Authority has limited control over most of Gaza and six of the seven major towns in the West Bank. An Israeli blockade of the West Bank town of Ramallah was lifted and Tel Aviv announced it would allow 10,000 workers to enter Israel from Gaza October 9.

The September clash, which left 60 Palestinians dead, most of them civilians, along with 15 Israeli soldiers, has shaken some capitalist investors. An article in the Wall Street Journal reported the foreign minister of Qatar announced economic ties with Tel Aviv were suspended and plans to send industrialists to discuss joint business deals were canceled until negotiations get back on track. Claridge Israel Inc., the largest international investor in Israel, is limiting its holdings there in the face of increasing political instability in the region.  
 
 
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