- Israel will not be asked in the future to withdraw to
the 1949 cease-fire lines (the Green Line) on the West Bank, according
to a letter U.S. President George Bush is to present to Prime Minister
Ariel Sharon in Washington this week.
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- According to the letter, the determination of borders
in a final status accord will take into consideration "demographic
realities" on the ground.
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- Sharon leaves on Monday night for a crucial meeting with
Bush at the White House on Wednesday. The main item on the agenda is Sharon's
disengagement plan.
-
- The two leaders will exchange letters that detail both
Sharon's plan, and what America will provide in exchange for the Israeli
pullout. After the meeting, Sharon and Bush will make statements from the
White House Rose Garden.
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- They will meet in the residential wing of the White House,
to emphasize Bush's support for Sharon. A proposal to hold the discussion
at the presidential retreat in Camp David was rejected because of Israeli
concern that it retains a negative image as the place where the Israeli-Palestinian
peace process collapsed four years ago.
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- In Israel, the Likud party's central election committee
will meet on Sunday afternoon to discuss Sharon's proposal to hold a Likud
referendum on the Gaza evacuation plan within three weeks. The committee
is expected to set a date for the Likud poll, apparently at the end of
April, immediately after Independence Day.
-
- An Israeli delegation of Sharon's bureau chief Dov Weisglass,
National Security Adviser Giora Eiland, and Sharon's foreign policy adviser
Shalom Turjeman on Saturday night left for Washington to finish work on
the letters to be exchanged. On Sunday the Israeli officials are to meet
with their American counterparts, led by Deputy National Security Adviser
Steve Hadley.
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- Sharon's letter to Bush will state that the prime minister
intends to bring the separation plan to his cabinet and to the Knesset
for approval. The letter says the plan includes the withdrawal of all Jewish
settlements and Israel Defense Forces from the entire Gaza Strip, apart
from the Philadelphi Road on the Egyptian border, and that it also calls
for the evacuation of four Jewish settlements in the northern Samaria section
of the West Bank.
-
- Sharon's letter will reiterate Israel's commitment to
the road map peace plan and to Bush's two-states vision, and it will emphasize
that Israel's planned steps under the separation plan are consistent with
the road map.
-
- Bush's letter to Sharon will also contain the following:
-
- * Reiteration of America's commitment to Israel's security
and to the preservation of its strategic qualitative edge.
-
- * A statement of commitment to the road map, and to the
prevention of other diplomatic initiatives.
-
- * Recognition of Israel's right to self defense and its
right, as need arises, to carry out anti-terror operations in areas from
which its forces are to be withdrawn.
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- * A declaration that Palestinian refugees can be absorbed
in the future in the Palestinian state, just as Jewish refugees from Arab
states were absorbed in Israel.
-
- Israeli officials believe the section of this letter
from Bush referring to final status borders is highly significant. They
believe it constitutes U.S. recognition of Israel's future annexation of
West Bank settlement blocs and the negation of a right of Palestinian refugee
return to Israel.
-
- Israel has been pushing for a clearer wording to the
letter, but the Americans have made it clear that it is difficult for them
to include an outward statement against the right of return due to their
relations with Europe and the Arab states.
-
- Israel also expects that the Bush administration will
support the planned route of the separation fence. In exchange for such
support, Israel has promised that no "enclaves" will be created
that trap hundreds of thousands of Palestinians, and that the West Bank
town of Ariel will not be connected to the main separation fence.
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- This weekend, MK Gilad Erdan (Likud), one of the party's
main opponents of the separation plan, petitioned the Likud election committee
to demand that Sharon's request to move up the date of the referendum be
rejected. Erdan argues that the Likud committee should allow at least 21
days of discussion about the plan from when Sharon releases its details
- which, says Erdan, have yet to be made public.
-
- Also, Erdan says, scheduling the referendum immediately
after Israel's Memorial Day and Independence Day would force Likud members
to canvass on these days, showing disrespect for the memorial and holiday
observances.
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- http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/414293.html
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