Sharon sets 'Gaza test' for besieged Palestinian leader
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon may end Yasser Arafat’s isolation in his besieged West Bank headquarters and let the Palestinian leader return to Gaza.
Under the plan, Arafat would be allowed leave his shell-battered compound in Ramallah, giving him the opportunity to crack down on militant groups and show he is serious about fighting terrorism, Sharon’s spokesmen Danny Ayalon said today.
‘‘If Arafat commits himself to fight terror in Gaza we will consider letting him move to Gaza,’’ Ayalon said.
None of the wanted militants Israel says are inside Arafat’s compound would be allowed to go with him.
Four of those men were today jailed for up to 18 years for the murder of an Israeli Cabinet minister last October.
The makeshift military tribunal sat in Arafat’s compound, and Palestinian security officials with no legal experience served as judges and lawyers.
Arafat approved the sentences, meaning there could be no appeals, an aide said.
Israel has demanded the killers of hard-line Tourism Minister Rehavam Zeevi, who was shot last October, stand trial in Israel, and Sharon immediately dismissed the verdicts.
‘‘I have to say, it would have been possible to avoid trying them twice, as they will anyway be brought to trial in Israel,’’ he said.
Palestinian Cabinet Minister Saeb Erekat ridiculed the plan to allow Arafat to move to Gaza as an Israeli ploy to take complete control of the West Bank.
‘‘All along the way, we knew that Sharon had an end game, and that end game is to re-occupy the West Bank,’’ he said.
Sharon told the New York Times he expected Arafat to fail the test and refuse to crack down on Gaza militants.
‘‘With Arafat, no one will be able to make peace,’’ he said.
In Bethlehem, where talks aimed at ending the standoff at the Church of the Nativity entered their third day, nine Palestinian teenagers were arrested by Israeli troops after they walked out of the basilica.
They were accompanied by two monks and carried the bodies of two dead Palestinians.
It was the largest group to leave the church in the three week standoff.
However, the most difficult issue - how to handle the armed men inside who are wanted by Israeli authorities as suspects in deadly attacks on Israelis - remains unresolved.
The Palestinians proposed they be escorted to the Gaza Strip. Israel has been demanding they surrender or accept deportation.
More than 200 Palestinians, many of them armed, fled into the church compound, built at the biblical site of Jesus’s birth, ahead of invading Israeli forces on April 2. As one of Christianity’s holiest sites, the standoff has caused a global outcry.
The Bethlehem invasion was part of a massive Israeli military operation that began March 29 with the aim of dismantling Palestinian militias behind deadly attacks on Israelis. Israeli forces say they won’t leave the city until the standoff ends.
