CIA chief in Cairo for Mideast security talks

U.S. Central Intelligence Agency chief George Tenet was expected to mediate the meeting, which was agreed on last week in the course of a meeting between U.S. President Bill Clinton and Palestinian President Yassir Arafat in Washington. Both sides, however, appeared to have different expectations from the parley.

Chief of the Palestinian preventive security in the Gaza Strip, Mohamed Dahlan said Sunday that the meeting was aimed at bringing the situation on the ground to what it was before the Palestinian uprising broke out on September 29 last year. He told Voice of Palestine Radio that this meant that "Israel must stop immediately its aggression on our people".

"If Israel really wants to bring the situation back to normal, it should immediately lift the closure, the siege and open all the border, commercial and crossing terminals and passage," he said. Israel, for its part, is going to demand that Palestinians round up militants who were released from jail after the outbreak of the uprising, that shooting attacks against Israelis be reduced, and the Palestinians take action to prevent roadside bombs from being laid, the Yediot Aharanot daily reported Sunday.

Meanwhile, the assessment Sunday in the Israeli media was that the sides would be unable to conclude a peace deal before Clinton leaves office on January 20. According to reports, Israel wanted Clinton to issue a "concluding statement" on the negotiations, to be used as a basis for talks under the new U.S. administration.

Both Israel and Palestinian leader Arafat have indicated they accept in principle Clinton's proposed parameters for renewed peace talks - interrupted in September by an outbreak of lethal clashes that have claimed more than 360 lives. The proposal reportedly envisages that Palestinians revoke their claim to a return of millions of refugees to Israeli territory while Israel would drop its claim to Jerusalem's Haram al Sharif/Temple Mount Compound, a site sacred to both Moslems and Jews.

In a related development, Palestinian Information Minister Yassir Abed Rabbo on Saturday accused U.S. special peace envoy Denis Ross of exerting pressure on the Palestinians to agree to a deal before January 20. "Ross plays one of his dirty games in coordination with Israel," Rabbo was quoted as saying in the Al Ayyam daily newspaper. "The aim of this game is to enable Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak to score more political points."

(la/dpa)