MIDEAST NEWS DIGEST
Mideast at 'Edge of the Abyss,' Says Egyptian Diplomat
Just days before the June 6 arrival of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak in Washington, D.C. for meetings with President Bush, a top Egyptian envoy told a small group of journalists in Washington that the Middle East is being pushed to the "edge of the abyss." Nabil Osman, the Egyptian Deputy Minister of Information, described the situation as the worst he has ever been, as he underlined the reasons for President Mubarak's visit. Noting that there were "too many visions" on the table, he said that Mubarak would be working to achieve a "unified approach," with the impetus for that approach coming from the United States.
The reversal of the earlier progress towards a Mideast settlement is taking a heavy toll on moderates in the region, he said. He stressed that it is in the U.S. national interest to lay out an agenda, as the increase of extremist influence would be detrimental to U.S. interests in the region. Mubarak will call for an "assault on the core of the problem," he said. A timetable must be developed which would encompass all the issues, including a timetable for the establishment of a Palestinian state.
"We need a deadline," said Osman, stressing that what is required is "a timetable for a final, not an interim, solution." The U.S. must move from a position of "gathering visions" to that of "formulating one." Any conference must have a clear-cut agenda, he stressed. "If the conference is a fiasco, it would be catastrophic," he said. A conference, in addition to being comprehensive, must be of an international nature, not simply a "regional" affair as proposed by Israeli Prime Minister Sharon. It must involve the U.S., Russia, the Europeans, and the larger regional powers, including Lebanon and Syria. A prerequisite to the conference would be the withdrawal of Israeli troops from the West Bank areas they recently entered. Osman also underlined the fact that the new elements in the situation were the clear willingness by the Arab states to recognize Israel, coming out of Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah's proposal and the Beirut summit, and the Arab states' rejection of terrorism as a weapon.
The visit to Washington by Sharon on June 10, which had been announced a few hours earlier, came as something of a surprise for the official, although he greeted it as a positive development. On June 2, President Mubarak gave an interview to the New York Times from Cairo, in which he said that "I think to declare a state just theoretically like this and then to sit and negotiate what would be the borders, what about JerusalemI think it may work." His proposal would confer statehood on all Palestinian lands recognized by the United Nations, before, not after, negotiating exact boundaries, refugees, the division of Jerusalem, and the dismantling of Israeli settlements. Mubarak said he would urge President Bush to intervene. "To leave the problem of the Middle East to Arafat and Sharon alone, you will get nowhere," he said. "It should be a heavyweight country like the United States, that should try to interfere, try to listen to this and that and in the end, make the two parties make a conclusion."
Sharon Summoned to Washington, Says Ha'aretz
Both Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Syrian Foreign Minister Farouk Shara will be going to Washington following the meetings between President George W. Bush and Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak June 7-8. On June 4, the Israeli paper Ha'aretz wrote that "Bush summons Sharon to Washington," although Sharon, typically, is claiming the visit was at his initiative. This is the seventh meeting with Bush since Sharon came to power in February 2001, although the last meeting was only 15 minutes long. The meeting comes after Sharon rebuffed the proposals by Bush envoys, Under Secretary of State William Burns and CIA Director George Tenet to the Middle East, to revive peace talks between Israel and the Palestinian Authority. Burns met with Ariel Sharon on May 31, and, according to the Washington Post, presented the Israeli Prime Minister with a three-part plan, that would see simultaneous security and political talks, as well as reform of the Palestinian Authority. The Burns proposal represented a departure from the doomed step-by-step approach that had characterized earlier efforts to get the Tenet and Mitchell "processes" moving in sequence.
Sharon, predictably, shot down the Bush-Burns new initiative, demanding that any peace talks be preceded by the elimination of Arafat, the "comprehensive reform of the PA" (Palestinian Authority) and the complete cessation of all terrorism. This puts the onus back on the Bush White House. According to Egyptian sources, President Mubarak will be singularly focussed on the Israel-Palestine issue when he meets Bush in Washington. Syrian Foreign Minister Shara is expected to arrive this week as well, and is likely to hold meetings with Secretary of State Colin Powell and other officials. Shara will also attend sessions of the United Nations Security Council because Syria will take over Presidency of the Security Council in June.
New Israeli Spy Satellite Could Locate Attack Targets in Iraq, Iran
Commenting to EIR, a senior Israeli intelligence source said this week that the recent launch of the Israeli spy satellite Ofek 5 enables Israel to start planning attacks on Iran and Iraq. This source said it was reported in the media that when the Israeli Cabinet was shown the first pictures the Ofek 5 had made of Tehran and Baghdad, the ministers cheered. The new satellite gives Israel an unprecedented capability to gather intelligence on Iran and Iraq, and the source claimed that Israel will now have the intelligence capability to locate targets to attack. Although it always had this capability for Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, and Egypt, not until now did Israel have the capability for Iran or Iraq.
Sharon the Winner in New Attacks by Palestinian Radicals
On June 4, a car bomb claimed by the Hamas-linked Islamic Jihad killed 18 Israeli passengers on a bus at the Meggido junction in Israel, and wounded some 40 others, according to Israeli government reports. In its initial response, the Israeli security cabinet met and decided to target the West Bank city of Jenin, where an armored column, including tanks and armored personnel carriers, entered the city. More Israeli attacks are expected, and the Palestinian bombing immediately revived the radical proposals inside the Sharon government for complete occupation of the Palestinian-controlled Area A.
On June 5, the Israeli paper Ha'aretz reported that Sharon's Education Minister Limor Livnat, who is a strong supporter of Benjamin Netanyahu called for this occupation in a radio interview. Well-informed Israeli observers report that Sharon is sure to benefit from this attack politically, and will use it as leverage to avoid being pressured to make concessions to the Palestinians when he meets with President Bush this week in Washington. An article in the Jerusalem Post cites an Israeli Foreign Ministry official as saying that the U.S. does not agree with Sharon's so-called step-by-step approach, which is in effect stalling. According to the Post, the official said that "the convening of a regional or international conference in July would provide the U.S. with momentum in trying to build an Arab coaltion for its campaign against Iraq at a later date."
Sharon's objective in meeting Bush is to ensure that Israel does not have to make any concessions. But this same official said that he did not expect the Bush Administration to pressure Sharon at this time. "Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and the European Union are prodding it to greater activism. But Bush's domestic agenda is pulling him into taking a more hands-off approach to the crisis until after the November elections, in order not to alienate Evengelical Christian voters, one of his strongest bases of support, and potential Jewish voters who would not view kindly Bush pressuring Sharon at this time."
Arafat Threatened After Palestinian Court Rules To Release Convicted Ze'evi Killer
A June 2 decision by the Palestinian Authority High Court in Ramallah, has led to threats by top Israeli officials against PA President Yasser Arafat. After ruling that there was no evidence against him, the Palestinian court ordered the release of Ahmed Sa'adat, the Palestinian Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) leader who had been convicted of the murder of Israeli Tourism Minister Rehavam Ze'evi in an Israeli hotel last October.
Sa'adat was one of the prisoners held in Arafat's beseiged Ramallah compound during the recent Israeli incurisions, who had then been transferred to Jericho and held under U.S. and British guard as part of the deal for Israeli withdrawal from Ramallah, and the release of Arafat from virtual imprisonment in a small area of his former compound.
Israeli Prime Minister Sharon said that the release of Sa'adat "violates what was agreed upon," and said Israel would try to prevent his release, while trying to extradite him to Israel. Sharon spokesman Ra'anan Gissen said, "If he is not brought to justice, we will bring justice to him." Defense Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer said that if the deal were broken, "Israel will be free of its commitments and will act in accordance with our own best interests." Referring to the Israeli threats to Sa'adat's life, Arafat ordered his continued detention.
The FBI, The 1993 World Trade Center Bombing, and Israeli Intelligence Front
Details provided in a June 2, 2002 story on CBS's "60 Minutes" program called "The Man Who Got Away," open new questions about FBI sting operations, Israeli intelligence inside the United States, and Israeli compromising of U.S. counter-terrorism efforts. On the CBS program, Neil Herman, the 1993 FBI head of the New York City Joint Terror Task Force during the first World Trade Center terror attack, was forced to explain his role in what the Iraqi government now calls a sting operation to implicate Iraq in the 1993 bombing.
Herman's investigation into the 1993 WTC attack was fraught with blunders and omissions, and there are claims it was a coverup of FBI and Israeli involvement in so-called Arab terror cells. Herman left the FBI to head the ADL's Fact Finding Division in 1999. Abdul Rahman Yasin, wanted as a co-conspirator in the 1993 bombing, was interviewed near Baghdad on May 23 by CBS News. He told CBS he was recruited to the cell of Ramzi Yousef (who was eventually convicted for the bombing), but the FBI let Yasin go after arresting him, even though he had chemical scars on his leg (from a spill when he was mixing the bomb ingredients), and even though his apartment had traces of explosives. Yasin was driven home by one of Neil Herman's FBI agents and was allowed to fly home to Iraq, where he grew up (although he is an American citizen). The ADL's Neil Herman told CBS it was a "collective decision" not to detain Yasin.
Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz told CBS that Iraq offered in 1994, and again in October 2001, after the 9-11 attacks, to turn Yasin over to the U.S. The offers were not accepted. Aziz stated: "Well, first of all, I have to tell you that we fear thatsending Yasin back to Iraq, after arresting him, and interrogate himinterrogating him, was a sting operation."
CBS's Stahl: "But, for whatpurpose?" Aziz: "To tell people later on, look, this man who participated in that event is now in Iraq, etc., and use it as they are doing now using many false pretexts, you see, to hurt Iraq in their own way."
CBS reported that the Egyptian government brokered the October 2001 offer to turn Yasin over to the United States. Although CBS never identified Neil Herman as the head of the ADL's Fact Finding Division (previously run by the late operative Irwin Suall, and then by Mira Lansky Boland), he is well known, having been one of the top FBI counter-terror "experts" when he left the FBI for the ADL in 1999. As EIW INDEPTH reported previously, the ADL was so deeply involved in espionage operations against U.S. citizens on behalf of Israeli intelligence, that former U.S. Congressman Pete McCloskey, who represented victims of ADL spying in a class-action suit, says the ADL should be made to register as an "agent of foreign influence" under U.S. law.
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