Pleasant surprise, the NYT mentioned the female medical patient bomber, if only in the inner paragraphs of the article. The usual pattern. Headline: "peace process continues", article "bombers, rockets and Israeli arrests continue"
Sharon and Abbas Meet to Plan Withdrawal
By GREG MYRE
Published: June 21, 2005
JERUSALEM, June 21 - The Israeli and Palestinian leaders met today in the first top-level talks since February, against a background of almost daily violence that has been straining their truce.
After the meeting between Prime Minister Ariel Sharon of Israel and Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian Authority president, a Palestinian official took a somewhat negative view of the talks, held at Mr. Sharon's private residence here.
"It was not up to the level of our expectations," the Palestinian prime minister, Ahmed Qurei, said in the West Bank city of Ramallah.
Speaking at a televised news briefing, Mr. Qurei said "what was presented to us was not genuine, not serious, not satisfying to us at all," according to a translation from Arabic shown on CNN.
Only hours before the two leaders met, Israeli forces arrested more than 50 suspected members of the militant group Islamic Jihad. All were seized in overnight raids in the West Bank.
The roundup comes after Islamic Jihad carried out three attacks in the past three days that killed two Israelis. Israel has repeatedly accused Mr. Abbas of not doing enough to stop such attacks.
On Monday, Palestinian gunmen ambushed and killed an Israeli motorist traveling in the West Bank, and Israeli troops shot and killed a Palestinian teenager along a border fence in the Gaza Strip.
A Palestinian woman with a bomb hidden in her trousers was arrested as she tried to pass the main crossing point between Gaza and Israel, the Israeli military said. While most Palestinians are barred from Israel, the woman, Wafa al-Biss, 21, had permission to receive hospital treatment in Israel for burns suffered in a cooking fire last year.
Mr. Sharon and Mr. Abbas reiterated their commitment to the shaky truce during a weekend visit by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.
Ms. Rice announced that the two sides had agreed that Jewish settler homes would be demolished after the evacuation of the nearly 9,000 settlers, planned for later this summer. That was the first tangible sign of coordination between Israel and the Palestinians on the Gaza withdrawal plan, though disagreements remain on many issues.
Today's meeting between Mr. Sharon and Mr. Abbas was expected to focus on the Gaza withdrawal and was not expected to produce major breakthroughs.
In an interview broadcast on Israeli television on Sunday night, Mr. Abbas said, "You have acknowledged our right for independence, and we agree Israelis have the right to live in peace and security."
But Mr. Sharon complains persistently that the Palestinians are making little or no effort to prevent attacks against Israelis. At the Erez crossing point between Gaza and Israel on Monday, Ms. Biss aroused the suspicion of soldiers as she approached, and then tried to detonate the bomb, which weighed more than 20 pounds, the military said.
The bomb did not go off, and soldiers seized her. The explosives were later detonated in a controlled blast, the military added.
After Ms. Biss suffered burns last year, she received treatment at Soroka Hospital in the southern Israeli town of Beersheba and had permission to make a return visit on Monday, the military said.
A military statement said that during interrogation, Ms. Biss said she had received the bomb from Al Aksa Martyrs Brigades and intended to blow herself up in a crowded area.
Israel permitted a small pool of journalists to interview Ms. Biss, and at one point, she was asked how many Jews she wanted to kill. "A lot of people, 40, 50," she said. Later she broke down and cried. "Do you think they will give me any mercy?" she asked them. "I hope they show me mercy. I didn't kill anyone."
Near the West Bank town of Jenin, Palestinian gunmen fired on a minivan, killing the Israeli driver, Yevgeny Rider, 30, and wounding a passenger, the Israeli military said.
Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility for what was the third shooting attack by the group in the last three days. Islamic Jihad said that it was not abandoning the truce, but that the attacks were in response to recent arrests of its members.
In Gaza, Israeli soldiers shot and killed a 17-year-old Palestinian, Ihab al-Nabahin, and wounded another teenager as the two climbed a border fence with Israel, the Israeli military and Palestinian medical officials said.
The Palestinians ignored several warnings before the soldiers opened fire, the military said. |
