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Arafat Extends Peace Offering Despite Continued Israeli Attacks
GAZA, Dec 8. (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - Yasser Arafat announced late Friday that he had arrested 17 of more than 30 anti-occupation activists wanted by Israel, after the army stepped up pressure on the beleaguered Palestinian leader with a devastating morning attack on a police headquarters here.
His announcement, in a rare interview to be broadcast later Friday by Israeli state television, came as the two sides were wrapping up under U.S. auspices a security meeting, which the Palestinians feared was doomed to fail following Israel's destructive operations in the Gaza Strip.
Despite Arafat's declaration that he ""extends his hand for peace with Israel," Israel continued to accuse the Palestinian leader of "deceit" and continued to pound the Palestinian territories, including attacking Arafat's personal guard, Force 17 - which is also charged with protecting foreign dignitaries visiting the region.
Israel renewed air attacks on Palestinian targets early Saturday in what it said was a warning to Arafat that it "means business" over demands he rein in on anti-occupation resistance activists.
Helicopter gunships attacked security buildings in the Gaza Strip despite Arafat's pledge to crack down on members of the Islamic Resistance
Movement, or Hamas, and Islamic Jihad.
"There were at least nine missiles aimed at the Force-17 building and military intelligence office in Rafah, those two buildings were destroyed and there was damage to the police headquarters," a source said.
An electric power transformer was also blown up and Rafah was completely blacked out, he added.
Twenty people are reported to have been injured.
Arafat's Palestinian Authority warned that the latest strikes and other "criminal action" would fuel more violence and "drown the region in a sea of blood".
The raids on Force 17, and intelligence offices in the Gaza Strip were meant to "show Arafat we mean business about keeping the ceasefire," said Avi Pazner, a spokesman for Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reported.
"Our aim is not to destabilize the region but to send a warning," he claimed.
The Palestinian Authority shot back, charging Sharon of torpedoing U.S. and international peace efforts.
"The head of the Israeli government is sabotaging ... peace efforts, including those of U.S. peace envoy Anthony Zinni, aimed at ending the violence," it said in a statement.
It accused the Israeli army of having "kidnapped and assassinated" on Friday two members of Arafat's Fatah movement, Louay Mishal, 24, and Ayed Elyan, 25, in the northern West Bank.
The Israeli army claimed in a statement that its soldiers shot dead two members of an "armed Palestinian commando as they prepared to carry out an attack near a Jewish settlement," AFP reported.
"The criminal Israeli action and the retaliation that it provokes have triggered an unending spiral of violence which is threatening to drown the region in a sea of blood," the Palestinian Authority warned.
The continued violence and the war of words threatened to propel the two sides to the brink of all-out war, while effectively putting Arafat's back to the wall.
In a rare interview with Israeli television Friday night, Arafat said he was nevertheless "extending his hands to peace with Israel" and "ready to implement all the agreements which have been concluded."
He stressed that his Palestinian Authority had publicly accepted a U.S.-brokered truce with Israel.
"Zinni gave me the night before yesterday a list of 33 men wanted by Israel and I arrested so far 17 of them," Arafat said in a rare interview on Israeli television. Israel said it had asked for 36 top activists to be arrested.
Arafat also said he was extending his "hand for peace with Israel for the sake of our children, despite everything. I am ready to implement all the agreements which have been concluded," with Israel, Arafat told the interviewer, reiterating that he publicly accepted a truce with Israel.
There has been rising criticism of the U.S. over that fact that it supplies weapons, -including Apache helicopters, tanks, bullets etc. - which Israel has used to kill over 800 Palestinians since the current Intifada against illegal Israeli occupation broke out 14 months ago.
Pazner claimed Israel had proof Palestinian security was responsible for mortar production and attempted to justify the latest aggression on Gaza as "a reaction to continued mortar fire by the Palestinian Authority itself."
Israeli aircraft again pounded Palestinian security buildings early Saturday in the southern Gaza Strip on the border with Egypt, in what the army said was "retaliation" for alleged mortar bombs fired at the Jewish settlement bloc of Gush Katif.
It said in a statement that 11 mortar bombs were fired since Thursday, but caused no casualties.
"Therefore, the army attacked Force 17 and Palestinian intelligence buildings in Rafah. These organizations are directly responsible for mortar attacks," it said.
Two U.S.-made Apache attack helicopters fired nine missiles into three buildings in one compound in Rafah overnight. There were no casualties, as the buildings had been evacuated. It was the second consecutive day of air strikes on Palestinian security targets in Gaza and the fourth this week.
The attack came hours after U.S.-brokered security talks between Israel and the Palestinians Friday and after Arafat said he had arrested 17 out of 33 activists wanted by Israel on a list Zinni gave him.
Israel said it had asked for 36 top militants to be arrested and one official said those detained so far were "small fry".
U.S. State Department deputy spokesman Philip Reeker said the talks were "constructive and focused on security ... specifically practical steps to combat terror and violence."
An Israeli defense ministry spokesman, however, told AFP after the meeting that the Palestinians were "deceiving" them and not doing enough to rein in militants.
Palestinian officials have said another round of talks should take place Sunday.
The pressure seemed to pile up on Arafat Friday after Turkish Prime Minister Bulent Ecevit said that Sharon had signaled to him his intention to "get rid of" Arafat.
However, Israeli and U.S. officials dismissed the report.
"Yasser Arafat remains the chairman of the Palestinian Authority, the recognized leader of the Palestinian people," U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell said, while calling on him to comply with Israeli requests to rein in extremists.
A Sharon spokesman said "the prime minister has pledged to Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Maher and U.S. President George W. Bush that he will not hurt Arafat personally."
Israeli Foreign Minister, Shimon Peres, also said - following Arafat's interview -- that removing the Palestinian leader from the political scene would be the "biggest mistake in the history of the state of Israel," because he would be replaced with Hamas and Islamic Jihad.
An Egyptain political analyst in Palestinian affairs, who refused to be named, reiterated Peres's views. He said that targeting the Palestinian Authority's infra structure is a message to Arafat that he has to follow the Israeli instructions and arrest resistance activists.
He added that the attacks do not aim at getting rid of Arafat's government as a few may think, because Sharon himself does not want to do that, or he will be faced by an even more difficult opposition, including resistance groups such as Hamas, Jihad and Fateh.
In an interview with the Lebanese daily newspaper, Al Safir, Egyptian President, Hosni Mubarak, said that if the Israelis make the mistake of killing Arafat, they will commit a crime against both the Israeli and Palestinian people. It will then be difficult to find someone else supported and endorsed by the Palestinian people.
Meanwhile, tension also continued to grip the streets of Gaza City, where armed Palestinian police were still deployed some 300 meters (yards) from the home of Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, the spiritual leader of Hamas.
Arafat, who has declared a state of emergency, ordered his police Wednesday to put Yassin under house arrest.
Egyptian Foreign Minister, Ahmed Maher, appealed to the United States on Friday to put pressure on Israel to respond to U.S. ceasefire initiatives in an effort to secure a lasting peace in the Middle East.
In a telephone conversation, Maher asked Powell to urge Israel to respond to efforts by Zinni and measures taken by the Palestinian Authority.
Maher told Powell he was "surprised" Israel had continued its raids on the Gaza Strip despite an Israeli-Palestinian security meeting being scheduled for the same day and despite Arafat's latest efforts to arrest resistance activists.
Returning from his visit to Israel, during which he met with Sharon Peres, as well as Arafat, Maher had said his talks had "failed."
"It is not a secret that talks failed to bring about a convergence of our points of view," Maher told journalists.
Maher said he had been tasked by President Mubarak with asking Israeli officials to "commit to serious negotiations for a fair and comprehensive settlement" to the ongoing conflict.
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