Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres said Saturday he wanted to resume peace talks with the Palestinians right away, as Israeli tanks shelled PA buildings in Ramallah in "retaliation" for the killing of a Jewish settler overnight.
The controversial announcement directly contradicts Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's policy of no negotiations before a complete halt to the “violence,” and drew sharp criticism from right-wing ministers in the coalition government.
Ronen Landau, 17, was shot dead while driving from Jerusalem to his home in the Givat Zeev settlement in the West Bank with his father and brother late Thursday, said Haaretz newspaper.
Landau became the 17th Israeli killed, along with 38 Palestinians, since the truce was announced on June 13. More than 660 people have died since the Palestinian uprising began in late September, over 500 of them Palestinians, according to AFP estimates.
"I call on Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Foreign Minister Shimon Peres to put an end to the policy of restraint and realize we are dealing with murderers who must be stopped," said Shaul Mizrahi, head of Givat Zeev's local council.
Israeli tanks responded early Friday by shelling two Palestinian police posts in Surda, north of Ramallah, the Palestinian political and commercial center in the West Bank.
Tanks then targeted three positions belonging to the Palestinian presidential guard unit, Force 17, in Beitunia, east of Ramallah, according to the Palestinian news agency, WAFA.
Witnesses in Ramallah said the boom of tanks shells echoed through the city until the early hours of the morning.
Helicopters hovered overhead throughout the assault, said WAFA.
Israeli Minister Without Portfolio Dan Naveh said he was driving on the same highway shortly before the settler's killing.
"Here we have another murderous attack," he told Israel
Television. "This shows [Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser] Arafat's true face as a terrorist," Haaretz quoted him as saying.
Effi Oshaya, who heads the Labor Party's representatives in Parliament, told army radio that Peres told party MPs Thursday it was time to resume direct negotiations.
"Shimon Peres told Labor leaders Thursday that we've finished with the appetizers course and now it's time for the main meal -- and that means to open direct and public negotiations with the Palestinians," he said, cited by AFP.
A Peres spokesman denied the report, but army radio cited three other Labor officials at Thursday's meeting who verified the story.
Peres has met Palestinian President Yasser Arafat twice in recent weeks, both times eliciting stinging criticism from hardliners in Sharon's feisty, multi-party cabinet.
"There can't be any negotiations," Naveh told army radio.
"We must continue to pressure Arafat and get him to reveal his true face -- and refuse the proposals of Peres to negotiate under fire."
Arafat told the European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana this week it was close to impossible for him to rein in Palestinian "violence" as long as Israel continued its "aggression."
A member of the militant Hamas movement was buried in the West Bank city of Nablus on Thursday, a day after he was blown to pieces in an attack Israel said it had carried out because the target was a “known terrorist.”
Meanwhile, Israel's chief rabbi, Israel Meir Lau, has given his seal of approval to the government's controversial practice of carrying out targeted killings of Palestinian "terrorists," Haaretz newspaper said Friday.
"The reality in the country is that of a 'mitzvah war' (a war of necessity), which is defined as one in which not only defence, but also initiative and daring is needed," Lau was quoted as saying,
The Palestinians accuse Israel of assassinating more than 40 militants, a policy Israeli officials have described as "self-defense" saying Arafat is failing to act against "terrorists."
Meanwhile, the Archbishop of Canterbury, leader of more than 75 million Anglican Christians, begins a four-day visit to the Holy Land on Friday that is being described as a "mission of peace," AFP said.
Archbishop George Carey will meet Sharon and Arafat and visit several church projects in areas that have seen some of the heaviest Israeli-Palestinian fighting, including a hospital in Gaza City and a rehabilitation center in Beit Jala, a Palestinian village near Bethlehem – Albawaba.com
© 2001 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
