Bush speech pleases Israel; Arafat ignores his call for new leadership

JERUSALEM -- Yasser Arafat ignored President Bush's call for a new Palestinian leadership but welcomed his Mideast policy speech Monday as a "serious effort to push the peace process forward."

Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon echoed Bush. A statement from his office said that "when the Palestinian Authority undergoes genuine reforms and a new leadership takes its place at its head ... it will be possible to discuss ways of moving forward by diplomatic means."

Senior Palestinian officials, however, insisted that only the Palestinian people, not Bush, could decide if they need to replace Arafat as their leader.

Saeb Erekat, an Arafat aide, said Bush's call to replace him was "not acceptable."

Erekat said Arafat won "free and fair elections" and "President Bush and others must respect this."

Arafat was elected president in 1996, winning 87 percent of the vote in an election that was part of interim peace agreements with Israel. His only opponent was Samiha Khalil, a 73-year-old social activist. She was never considered a serious challenger.

Bush said peace requires a new Palestinian leadership _ one "not compromised by terror." He said "reform must be more than cosmetic changes or a veiled attempt to preserve the status quo" if the Palestinians are to fulfill their aspirations for a state alongside Israel. Bush did not identify Arafat by name in the speech.

As for the Israelis, Bush said they should withdraw to West Bank positions they held two years ago and stop building homes for Jews on the West Bank and in the Gaza Strip. Ultimately, he said, Israel should agree to pull back to lines before the 1967 Mideast war.

Sharon's statement said that "when the Palestinian Authority undergoes genuine reforms and a new leadership takes it place at its head... it will be possible to discuss ways of moving forward by diplomatic means."

Sharon spokesman Raanan Gissin said that when Palestinians chose Arafat, they chose a policy of terror that sent suicide bombers into Israel. "If they want to choose the road to peace, they know exactly what they have to do," he said.

In a statement, Arafat said the Palestinian leadership welcomes Bush's ideas "and finds them to be a serious effort to push the peace process forward."

"The Palestinian leadership and President Arafat hope that the details will be discussed during the direct and bilateral meetings with the American administration" and international mediators, the statement said.

In his speech, Bush said that when Palestinians have new leaders, institutions and security arrangements with their neighbors, Washington "will support the creation of a Palestinian state, whose borders and certain aspects of its sovereignty will be provisional until resolved as part of a final settlement in the Middle East."

Israeli Communications Minister Reuven Rivlin said Israel was pleased with the speech, but rejected the concept of a provisional Palestinian state.

Rivlin, a close ally of Sharon, said that according to the Bush formula, the first steps are up to the Palestinians, to reform their administration and "get rid of all those terrorists who live there."

Palestinian officials took heart from Bush's insistence that ending Israeli occupation is the only way to achieve peace.

"It is the first time that an American administration recognized that the only solution for this conflict is to end the occupation and to have a state to live in peace beside Israel _ this is a historic change in the American stand," said Palestinian Cabinet Secretary Ahmed Abdel Rahman.

Israeli Defense Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer will support "a very significant compromise for the sake of peace," a statement said, "if we find opposite us a reliable, peace-seeking partner, clean of terrorism and with a will for historic compromise."

Bush's speech was broadcast live throughout the Mideast on Arab satellite TV stations to a region that for weeks had been waiting for Bush to jolt Palestinians and Israelis out of their violent impasse.

In the Gaza Strip, about a dozen Palestinians watched Bush's speech in a small restaurant in Beach refugee camp. "I swear to God that this speech was written and sent by Sharon," said Suleiman Berberi, a 39-year-old Arabic teacher.

When Bush spoke of Palestinians' right to have a state next to Israel, Berberi said: "Look, he is mixing the poison with honey and he wants us to drink it."

An Israeli university student wondered how realistic Bush's call was for a change in Palestinian leadership. "We can't change Arafat, and the Palestinians will re-elect him. So what are we supposed to do, continue like this?" asked Efrat Levavi, 23.

Yehudit Tayyar, spokeswoman for the Settlers' Council, praised the call for new Palestinian leadership, but said Bush should not try to impose a freeze on settlement construction. "This is a domestic Israeli issue and no business of the United States," she said. The council represents about 200,000 Jewish settlers in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

Arab world academics and analysts condemned Bush's speech, with Syrian political analyst Imad Shueibi calling it "the worst speech in the history of U.S.-Arab relations." Mohamed el-Sayed Said, Washington bureau chief for the Egyptian daily Al-Ahram, said "the Arab world will not sleep tonight."

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