Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat asked Ahmed Qureia on Tuesday to stay on as prime minister and form a new government, officials said, but their bitter dispute over control of the Palestinian security forces remained unresolved.
Conflicting accounts of Tuesday's meeting of the PLO leadership cast further uncertainty over the situation. While two officials who attended the meeting said Qureia had accepted Arafat's offer, the prime minister said he had not received a formal invitation.
Even if Qureia does accept the offer, the lingering disagreement over the security forces threatened to lead to further confrontation and continued deadlock over a US-backed peace plan.
Meanwhile, Israelis voted in local elections Tuesday, and early results showed that just nine months after an overwhelming loss to Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's Likud in national elections, the moderate Labor held its own in city balloting, winning several important mayor races.
Experts predicted Sharon's party would take a severe beating because of Israel's difficult security and economic situation.
However, local issues dominated, and party leaders admitted that it was difficult to project the results onto the national scene.
"I believe there was some rejection of the involvement of both of the major parties in the election, there's no escaping that," Labor Party leader Shimon Peres told Israel Radio.
The US and other international mediators have been closely watching Palestinian efforts to form a government, saying a stable leadership is needed to push the "road map" peace plan forward. Israel reacted cautiously to Tuesday's announcement.
Qureia currently heads an emergency Cabinet; its term expires Nov. 4. There had been some uncertainty over whether Qureia, upset by arguments with Arafat over control of the security forces, would agree to continue in the job.
Palestinian officials gave conflicting accounts about Tuesday's meeting of the PLO leadership, headed by Arafat.
Foreign Minister Nabil Shaath and Abbas Zaki, a senior PLO official, said Qureia had accepted Arafat's invitation.
"The plan is to have this government ready" by the time the term of the emergency Cabinet expires, Shaath said. "We do not want any more time wasted."
Qureia said he had not received a formal offer, which must come in writing, but indicated that he would accept. "If things move in that direction, I think we will continue," he said.
Qureia's previous efforts to form a larger government have failed because of wrangling over appointments. In particular, Qureia had been unable to agree with Arafat over the key post of interior minister, which would control the various Palestinian security agencies.
Shaath said the interior minister's post so far remains unfilled.
"There will be a strong, a capable interior minister who will exercise all security responsibilities assigned to him," he said. "No names were discussed this morning, but as I said the principles and the basis are all agreed to."
Israel and the US say the forces must be consolidated under one body in order to be effective in dismantling militant groups. Qureia, like his predecessor, Mahmoud Abbas, has said he would try to persuade militants to lay down their arms, but would not use force against them.
Sheik Ahmed Yassin, the spiritual leader of the Islamic militant group Hamas, said Tuesday that Hamas "is ready discuss a ceasefire" with Qureia.
"But this does not mean that Hamas now has no power to retaliate and to make the Zionist enemy [Israel] pay the proper price for its crimes," Yassin said in an interview with the BBC Arabic service.
Zalman Shoval, an adviser to Sharon, said the Israelis were waiting to see results from Qureia.
"The test for Mr. Qureia ... will now be whether he will be able to lead a policy as dictated by the road map, mainly to take effective steps to break up the terrorist infrastructure and stop the violence," Shoval said.
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