The Palestinian Authority's security organizations are unable to assume security control of cities in the West Bank, Prime Minister Salam Fayad told senior Israeli officials during recent meetings. Fayad told Israeli officials that the PA's security forces are unable "to impose law and order in the West Bank at this time."
Meanwhile today, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is scheduled to meet Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas in Jericho. The meeting will focus on making substantive progress in preparation for the regional summit planned to take place in November in Washington.
During meetings with senior Israeli officials, the interim Palestinian prime minister and his interior minister, Abd al-Razek al-Yihiya, made it clear that the PA's security cannot at this time assume control of West Bank cities. Among those to whom this message was conveyed recently was Shin Bet chief Yuval Diskin.
Originally, Fayad and al-Yihiya made the transfer of some West Bank cities to PA security control one of their prime requests of Israel. Israel did not immediately reject the request, but asked that the PA security forces be prepared to take action against any militants who may try to carry out a terror attack against Israel from areas in which Israel would surrender security control.
However, Palestinian security commanders admitted before the PA leadership that their forces are not currently capable of preventing terrorist attacks against Israel, or, as Israel defines it, of "combatting terrorism."
Fayad told Israel that the PA's security forces are unable to "impose law and order in the West Bank at this time."
Senior Palestinian officials told Haaretz that Fayad told Israel, immediately after he assumed power, that he intended to focus on the gradual establishing of law and order in the West Bank, before turning his attention to political negotiations.
"However, after we realized that there were Israeli limitations on our demands to expand the 'fugitives agreement,' and the security forces in the West Bank are still not prepared to take on responsibility in the cities, Fayad changed his stance on the matter of negotiations, and this became essential - almost exclusively so - in bolstering the PA's position in the West Bank," the senior Palestinian officials said yesterday.
During their meeting today at the InterContinental Hotel in Jericho, Olmert and Abbas plan to push ahead in achieving maximum progress in negotiations.
"The purpose is to achieve the maximum possible mutual understandings on a two-state solution prior to the summit in the fall and in a way that will not endanger the entire process," a senior political source in Jerusalem said yesterday. The aim is to stabilize Abbas' rule in the West Bank so that the PA will be able to carry out its commitments, particularly on the security front.
This will be the first time an Israeli prime minister has visited the PA since the outbreak of the intifada, in September 2000. The meeting will take place under draconian security measures; Palestinian Presidential Guard officials and Shin Bet VIP Security officers have held a number of meeting in recent days to prepare the ground.
The meeting between the two leaders will be restricted to the press and there will be a photo-opportunity only at the beginning.
Palestinian sources said that the two leaders will have a private lunch, and most of the meeting will be behind closed doors, with no aides present.
Abbas and Olmert will pick up where their talks begun at their meeting in Jerusalem two weeks ago left off, with a focus on the "Agreement of Principles."
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