PA influence

YEDIOT AHARONOT 2/5/99: "The Palestinian Authority [PA] intends to publish advertisements in the Israeli Arab press directly calling on Israeli Arabs to participate in the elections with the aim of toppling Binyamin Netanyahu.

Sky, a Palestinian advertising and media firm based in Ramallah, recently asked the Israeli newspaper Kull al-'Arab for a quotation on the cost of running advertisements up to the elections.

In the letter, it said that "the PA is interested an intensive campaign aimed at encouraging Israeli Arabs to participate in the elections." Kull al-'Arab editor Zuhayr Andrius said yesterday that he sees no reason for his newspaper not to run the ads."

PA blackmail

GLOBES 2/7/99: "The Palestinian Authority is acting to raise billions of dollars in exchange for not declaring the establishment of an independent Palestinian state, with Jerusalem as its capital, on May 4, 1999.

The sources added that Palestinian Authority chairman Yasir 'Arafat had not yet detailed the amount he would demand in exchange for postponing the declaration, and that he would delay doing so until close to the original date for the conclusion of the final settlement talks, on May 4, 1999, in order to raise the price.

Israeli defense sources noted that initial hints regarding the amount of the Palestinian demand can be gleaned from comments made by Palestinians in unofficial talks referring to the contributing countries' donations as "peanuts".

At the weekend, the contributing countries confirmed the continued transfer of money to the Palestinian Authority, to the tune of $3 billion by the year 2003. The Palestinians demanded assistance totaling $4.5 billion to finance the long-term development program.

During the discussions, European Union representatives hinted that they would take certain measures if the transfers were not transparent. However, they refrained from stipulating that the continued transfers were contingent on a halt to the corruption."

Ezer & Nayef

THE JERUSALEM POST 2/9/99: "President Ezer Weizman yesterday defended his decision to shake the hand of Nayef Hawatmeh, the general secretary of the Damascus-based Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP), at King Hussein's funeral. He was reacting to some sharp reactions to the handshake.

In the long wait at the palace before the funeral began, Hawatmeh is said to have approached Weizman with an outstretched hand.

According to Beit Hanassi Director-General Arye Shumer, Hawatmeh said:

"You are the Middle East's man of peace. This is what everyone is saying in Syria. You are the man for peace in the region. We know that you represent the people of Israel."

Weizman said in response that he hoped Syria and Lebanon would join the peace process.

Shumer, who was standing next to the president and reported the conversation, said that Hawatmeh added:

"I hope we shall meet again."

Hawatmeh, whose group has carried out a series of deadly terrorist attacks on Israelis, including the 1974 Ma'alot attack in which 24 schoolchildren and a soldier were killed, has in recent years called for a two-state solution, but continues to object to the Israeli-Palestinian accords, which he says falls short of meeting the Palestinian people's aspirations.

One of the former pupils injured in the Ma'alot attack, Yishai Maimon, said that "we have been harmed very badly from that hand shake, when Hawatmeh has still not declared his support for peace and an end to hostile activities."

A representative of the bereaved parents of the tragedy has requested to meet with Weizman and protest, seeking an apology. Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu avoided directly criticizing the president.

But asked if he would be prepared to shake Hawatmeh's hand, he replied: "I think we have to talk to those who are willing to see us above the ground, not under it."

On his return to Jerusalem, Weizman described the conversation as interesting, and said that Hawatmeh was excited about the meeting.

Reacting to Netanyahu's statement that he would not have acted in a similar fashion, Weizman said:

"The prime minister would not have shaken his hand, but I did. That's it. I wish all the other Hawatmehs would be prepared to speak to us."

Weizman called for a realpolitik approach. He said that anyone involved in fighting who realizes it is better to live in peace with his enemy is welcome to come and talk to him.

Noting that both he and Netanyahu had sat alongside Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat during the funeral, Weizman told reporters:

"Is that a person who did not make problems for Israel? "What was Arafat four years ago, an angel, a dove of peace? He murdered and did all sorts of things, but the moment arrived when he decided that the time had come, for the sake of his people, to make peace with us.

And then, the late Yitzhak Rabin shook his hand, [and now] Prime Minister Netanyahu shakes his hand. "I am in favor of shaking hands with every enemy who is willing to shake my hand."...

During the president's short chat with King Abdullah II, the monarch said that his father had been very fond of him. Abdullah added that he planned to uphold his father's legacy and to maintain close ties with Israel.

Israel Radio said Foreign Minister Ariel Sharon reprimanded Weizman for the exchange with Hawatmeh. Furthermore, Sharon said it was Weizman who approached Hawatmeh to shake his hand, and that center party prime ministerial candidate Yitzhak Mordechai followed suit.

Speaking yesterday on Channel 1's Politica program, former Rabin aide Eitan Haber, who was at the funeral, confirmed that both men had shaken hands with Hawatmeh, although Mordechai is denying the contact.

The Left praised Weizman's decision to shake Hawatmeh's hand. "We live in a period where we do not refuse an outstretched hand," Labor MK Ephraim Sneh told reporters, adding that Israel is trying to unravel the problems in the Middle East and not to perpetuate them..."

New 'encampments'

THE JERUSALEM POST: "Charges by Peace Now that since Defense Minister Moshe Arens's appointment settlers have beefed up construction and set up illegal encampments in Judea and Samaria were rejected by the Civil Administration yesterday, who declared that all of the encampments are satellite neighborhoods of existing communities and within the individual communities' overall plans.

Peace Now director Mossy Raz said that at least three new encampments have been established since Arens took over the ministry, the rest he said are expansions of existing encampments set up following the Wye agreement.

The recent findings he said are based on an overflight early Sunday morning carried out by the movement on a regular basis to monitor settlement activity.

Raz said the first new encampment includes a bus used as temporary housing quarters by settlers, set up on Mount Kabri, three kilometers south east of Alon Moreh. The second encampment is situated 2.5 kilometers south of Shvut Rahel, not far from the settlement's neighborhood Shvut Rahel Vav.

Four caravans and a water tower are at the site, and a road linking the encampment to the settlement has also been constructed.

The third one, said Raz, is situated a kilometer north of Eli. Civil Administration spokesman Lt. Peter Lerner rejected the charges, declaring that none of the encampments are new. Meanwhile Raz charged that several encampments established after Wye have expanded, with more caravans taken to the sites.

"It is clear that the settlers are seeking to achieve territorial contiguity between the different settlements, and are planning to link areas between Itamar and Alon Moreh, Bracha and Yitzhar," said Raz charging that the settlers actions constitute anarchy...."

Likud results

HA'ARETZ 2/9/99: "Surprising results in the Likud elections last night: Despite rumors of "hit lists" and predictions of insufficient representation of Sephardic candidates, the first five slots include three Sephardi candidates:

Science Minister Silvan Shalom, Tourism Minister Moshe Katzav and MK Meir Sheetrit, as well as Communications Minister Limor Livnat, who was an alleged candidate of the "hitlists."

Defense Minister Moshe Arens found himself very low on the Likud's list for Knesset, in the 26th slot, and Foreign Minister Ariel Sharon came in eighth. Netanyahu explained that Arens was not elected to a higher slot because he joined the race relatively late.

"He is and will continue to be an outstanding minister of defense," Netanyahu said last night upon hearing the results.

Tensions soared in the Likud late last night as rumors abounded of behind-the-scenes deals and "hit lists" circulated during the party's internal elections in an apparent attempt to keep opponents of Netanyahu off the party's slate.

Some 2,376 members of the Likud Central Committee, 89 percent of those eligible, took part in the crucial voting to shape the party's Knesset list...In the computerized tally, each member was asked to enter 13 names of his choice for the Knesset list.

The main topics of conversation in party circles throughout the day were the deals and lists allegedly orchestrated and circulated by various powerful party officials..."

Golan's Nimrod

HA'ARETZ 2/9/99: "In the northern Golan Heights, in the heart of a Druze enclave, a new Jewish settlement is being created in secret. Its name: Nimrod.

The first family took up residence last week, and, in the course of the next two months, another four to eight families are expected.

Although no formal request has been submitted to the regional planning and construction committee, the settlement has become a fait accompli.

A source in the Rural Settlement Division (RSD) in the World Zionist Organization (WZO) has told Ha'aretz that the settlement has not yet been "defined."

The site of this clandestine settlement was occupied for 19 years by a Nahal unit of the Israel Defense Forces. (Nahal soldiers combine military service and agricultural work.)

Last year, the last Nahal soldiers left the site and it was transferred by the Defense Ministry's Youth and Nahal Division (YND) to the WZO's Rural Settlement Division. A senior source, involved in Nimrod's creation, claims that an agreement worked out between the YND and RSD allows for the "civilianization" of this military outpost.

In the wake of contacts between the WZO and the Golan Heights Regional Council, an agreement was reached on converting the outpost into a civilian settlement, the 33rd on the Golan Heights.

Last year, ever since the disappearance of the IDF's Nahal unit, a few soldiers have been left behind to guard the equipment there: a few structures and some military equipment.

The role of the pioneer family is to establish a presence on the site and to supervise the renovation work being carried out there on the structures in preparation for the arrival of additional families....

Council head Yehuda Volman has adamantly refused to comment on this issue, while sources in the council have defined the settlement as "highly classified."

In fact, only a few council members were in on the secret...

Sources on the Golan Heights feel that the new community's proximity to an area with a considerable Druze population, primarily pro-Syrian, is meant to deliver a message:

the new community's proximity to an area with a considerable Druze population, primarily pro-Syrian, is meant to deliver a message:

"Israel has no intention of leaving the Golan."