Israeli proposals aim to impress

Press, 5 April 1989, Page 10

Israeli proposals aim to impress

NZPA-Reuter Tel Aviv Israel’s Prime Minister, Yitzhak Shamir, has left for a key visit to the United States with what appears to be a programme of carefully devised .steps to show Israel is moving .to break the Middle East deadlock.

At an airport news conference before leaving early yesterday, Mr Shamir refused to disclose specific proposals he would present in his first talks with the Bush Administration.

“We are looking for the proper solutions to the problems we are facing. I hope the Americans will be interested in the proposals we are bringing with us, which.are aimed to bring us closer to peace,” he said.

Israeli officials have said the ideas include elections in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip

to choose Palestinian negotiators for an interim agreement only if a 15-month-old Palestinian uprising against Israeli rule there is halted.

Israel Television quoted United States State Department officials as say-

ing the proposal for elections was significant but was not enough for a diplomatic breakthrough.

The Palestine Liberation Organisation on Monday rejected any attempts to end the Palestinian revolt and any suggestion of elections under Israeli occupation.

Mr Shamir will try to show the Americans that his Government has already begun a dialogue with Palestinians in the occupied areas, despite Palestinian claims that any substantive talks would have to have the endorsement of the P.L.O. Israeli officials were to meet prominent Arab officials and activists for the third consecutive day yesterday, and the army will release Arabs jailed in the revolt as a goodwill gesture ahead of the Muslim Ramadan holiday, which begins in two days,

security sources said. Meanwhile, the violence in the occupied territories has shown no signs of subsiding. Israeli troops shot dead a protester on Monday, bringing to at least 421 the number of Arabs who have died in the uprising. Seventeen Jews have died.

A few hundred Rightist supporters lined the road leading out of Jerusalem on Monday night, playing folk music and holding signs that read “Shamir, don’t surrender” in a festive send-off for the Prime Minister.

Earlier, several hundred Leftists from the Peace Now group marched through Jerusalem to Mr Shamir’s residence to urge him to talk to .the P.L.O. and take bold peace moves in Washington. Meanwhile, in Washington, the United States

President, George Bush, said after talks with the Egyptian President, Hosni Mubarak, that the two countries wanted an end to Israeli occupation of lands seized in the 1967 Arab-Israeli war.

“Egypt and the United States share the goals of security for Israel, the end of the occupation, and achievement of Palestinian political rights,” Mr Bush said.

In his closing remarks, Mr Mubarak sounded optimistic about prospects for peace: “We believe the (Middle East) stands at a historic crossroads

... The situation is right for an active effort — more than ever before.”

The renewed United States dialogue with the P.L.O. and evidence that Israeli public opinion was swinging towards accommodation were positive signs, he said.