Israel on Tuesday rebuffed US President George W. Bush's personal request to withdraw its forces from Palestinian-controlled territory, putting new pressure on American-Israeli relations and the US counter-terror coalition with its Arab allies.
The impasse became clear after Bush and US Secretary of State Colin Powell met separately Tuesday with the Israeli foreign minister, Shimon Peres.
They renewed the US' demand that Israel pull out of Palestinian-controlled areas of the West Bank. Peres said Israel would not do so until Yasser Arafat's security forces arrested the men who murdered Israel's tourism minister last week.
Peres said Bush warned that violence in the Middle East made it harder for the US to maintain its anti-terrorism coalition. "He would like very much the flames to go down, and I told him we shall do whatever we can to reduce them," Peres said.
Bush said: "I would hope the Israelis would move their troops as quickly as possible." At the State Department, Powell reiterated Monday's demand for an immediate pullout, a spokesman said.
"We would like to withdraw immediately," Peres said. "The minute the Palestinians will take the necessary steps, this may happen."
But violence continued early yesterday in the West Bank, as at least six Palestinians were killed by Israeli soldiers in the town of Beit Rima.
Israeli forces began to reoccupy parts of six Palestinian controlled cities and towns after an assassin shot Rehavam Zeevi, the tourism minister and a right-wing former general, at the Hyatt Hotel in Jerusalem on Oct. 17. The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, a secular group with Marxist-Leninist roots, said it killed Zeevi to avenge Israel's assassination of its leader, Abu Ali Mustafa, in August. Since the slaying of Zeevi, Arafat has outlawed the organization. There is no public evidence that the Palestinian Authority has arrested Zeevi's killer or killers.The ensuing tensions placed the region at its "most dangerous moment in a decade," the UN special envoy for Middle East peace, Terje Roed-Larsen, said in a statement released Tuesday.
Peres, who also received Bush's condolences on Zeevi's death, attempted to convey the impression that no differences existed between Israel and its strongest ally, the US.
"I didn't discover any contradiction in the American policy and the Israeli policy," he said.
The call for an immediate Israeli withdrawal was balanced by demands from Bush and Powell to Arafat for the arrests of those responsible for killing Zeevi, along with suspects in other terrorist attacks on Israelis.
"We continue to call upon Chairman Arafat to do everything he can to bring the killer to justice," Bush said. "It's very important that he arrest the person who did this -- or those who did this -- act, and continue to arrest those who would disrupt and harm Israeli citizens. He must show the resolve necessary to bring peace to the region."
Bush stopped short, however, of calling for Arafat to turn over the accused killers to Israel for trial there, a demand of some Israeli officials.
In Ramallah, on the West Bank, the Palestinian information minister, Yasser Abed Rabbo, said "the Palestinian Authority is determined to find those responsible for the murder and to take them before Palestinian tribunals." He said that it had made arrests, though he did not provide any details, and he said Arafat had recommitted Palestinian groups to a cease fire.
The Palestinian leadership, he said, had held "an intensive dialogue with all factions telling them that this is the end of the game and that everyone should abide by the rules and the obligations that we have made."
Addressing Israeli criticism that the US was pressuring Israel to build support among Arab nations, Abed Rabbo said, "What's wrong with getting support from the Arab world?"
Israel, long seen as the staunchest ally of the US in the Middle East, and the recipient of US$3 billion in annual US military and economic aid, is also a crucial counter-terrorism partner. Its national security has been a fundamental part of US foreign policy since Israel's creation.
So the American effort to strike a balance is delicate at best. In the days before the killing of Zeevi, the US hoped for a return to political talks between the Israelis and Palestinians, said the State Department spokesman, Richard Boucher. The killing, the Israeli reaction and its rebuff to the US on Tuesday appeared to have damaged those hopes.
The American demand for an Israeli withdrawal was viewed by many Israelis as an attempt to score points in the Arab world at Israel's expense.
"The way was wrong, the timing was wrong, and you don't treat an ally like this," said one Israeli government official.
Shlomo Ben-Ami, a former Israeli foreign minister and a critic of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, said: "Imagine now that Sharon says, `Well, all right, I withdraw.' Then what will be the image of Israel in the Arab world?"
Zalman Shoval, a former Israeli ambassador now visiting the US as Sharon's personal envoy, said the American demand "will again encourage the Palestinian side to draw the wrong conclusion, that the pressure is now on Israel and not on them."
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