Israeli army intends to announce the lifting of restrictions on Palestinian areas in the West Bank, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's spokesman Ra'anan Gissin confirmed Sunday.
The move is designed to ease the humanitarian plight in the Palestinian areas, allowing the residents to purchase food and the access of the media and international relief organizations.
The Israeli army had declared the Palestinian areas recently reoccupied by the Israeli troops as "closed military zones," barring foreign media or citizens from entering.
The army will continue restrictions on the compound of Palestinian National Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat in the West Bank city of Ramallah, the Church of Nativity in Bethlehem where there has been a standoff between Israeli troops and Palestinians holed up inside, and Jenin where the Israeli troops are still carrying out their operation.
The move came when visiting U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell is having an extended meeting with Arafat in Ramallah. The meeting started at 11 a.m. local time (0800 GMT) and was originally expected to last one hour.
Sharon said that the Palestinians holed up in the Church of Nativity in Bethlehem will be presented with two options, standing trial in Israel or expulsion to any other country.
Sharon also insisted that the Palestinians involved in the murder of former Israeli cabinet minister Rehavam Ze'evi be handed over to Israel.
At the Israeli cabinet meeting on Sunday morning, Foreign Minister Shimon Peres had a confrontation with Sharon over the issue, urging him to seek other solutions. Sharon, however, was firm in his position, saying that the Ze'evi murders must wind up in Israeli hands and that he would even risk elections on the matter.
Sharon said he had proposed to Powell that a regional conference take place with the participation of Arab states and Palestinian representatives, but without the attendance of Yasser Arafat.
Israel Radio Sunday quoted senior U.S. officials as saying that Powell would probably fly to Damascus on Tuesday and is expected to meet Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad on the worsening situation along the Israel-Lebanon border.
After that, Powell is to return to Israel to continue shuttling between the Israelis and Palestinians.
Also at Sunday's cabinet meeting, Defense Minister Binyamin Ben- Eliezer said that the number of Palestinians killed in Jenin is dozens, not hundreds.
Ben-Eliezer said most of those killed were armed and were involved in fighting. He also said that the Israeli army had not buried the bodies of the dead Palestinians. He said that the military asked the families themselves to bury the bereaved with the help of the International Red Cross, but the Palestinians refused the offer.
Several ministers criticized the army spokesman who said that about 200 Palestinians were killed in Jenin. Ben-Eliezer said the spokesman made a mistake. There has been a raging dispute between the Israelis and Palestinians over what happened in the Jenin refugee camp. Palestinians said that there was a "massacre" in which some 500 Palestinians were killed.
(Xinhua News Agency April 15, 2002)
