By
The Associated Press
JERUSALEM - Israel's Foreign Minister Shimon Peres traveled to Jordan and Egypt yesterday seeking to forge the outlines of a Mideast cease-fire, but bomb attacks, mortar fire and gunbattles at home cast a long shadow over the latest peace initiative.
Peres presented Israel's reservations to a peace deal put forward by Egypt and Jordan for ending seven months of Israeli-Palestinian fighting. But he said there were hopes for a deal that could lead to resuming peace negotiations. Jordan's King Abdullah II told Peres when they met later in the day that "ending the aggression and the use of force against the Palestinians and lifting the siege" is the only way to make progress, according to a statement from the king's office
In the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, the violence persisted. Palestinian militants set off two bombs targeting Jewish settlers in the West Bank, and Israeli police located a third bomb and set off a controlled explosion in the coastal city of Netanya.
In one of the West Bank explosions, a car bomb went off not far from an Israeli school bus outside Nablus, killing a Palestinian suspected of setting it off and injuring a second Palestinian. Also, Palestinians mortared the Jewish enclave of Kfar Darom in the Gaza Strip, but no one was injured. Israeli troops and Palestinian gunmen traded fire at two locations in Gaza, wounding at least three Palestinians, according to hospitals.
The Egyptian-Jordanian peace plan calls for the two sides to declare a cease-fire, and
if the calm holds for four weeks, then negotiations would resume on a political
settlement. However, Israel has expressed opposition to a number of the plan's details.
A statement issued by the office of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said the Israeli
leader would "not hold any negotiations under fire, and stressed that there must be a total halt to terrorism in all its forms."
Also, there must be a "trial period for the cessation of violence," Sharon's office said. Israeli media reported Israel wanted it to be longer than the four weeks in the Arab proposal.
Sharon has also said repeatedly that he would seek an interim agreement with the
Palestinians to be implemented over an extended period of time and not a sweeping final peace deal.
However, the Palestinians say that after seven years of on-and-off negotiations, they are not interested in any more interim arrangements.
Palestinian Information Minister Yasser Abed Rabbo said the Israelis should not attempt to rework the Arab plan. "They should accept it or leave it," he said.
The proposal also calls for an Israeli freeze on the construction of Jewish settlements in the West Bank and Gaza, and for the Israelis to ease the tight restrictions imposed on Palestinian areas.
Since Israeli-Palestinian fighting began last September, most of the 130,000 Palestinians who work in Israel have been barred from traveling to their jobs, strangling the economy in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Peres said that "from this morning we are going to take steps to facilitate the life of the (Palestinian) people in the territories in every possible way."
About 10,000 Palestinians are now being allowed into Israel each day to work, but the number could soon double, Israeli officials have said.
After the stops in Egypt and Jordan, Peres heads to New York, where he is to meet U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan today. Peres is to meet President Bush in Washington on Thursday.
