Sharon rejects talks on Jewish settlements

ISRAELI Prime Minister Ariel Sharon yesterday rejected any talk of dismantling Jewish settlements in the foreseeable future despite US calls for conciliatory gestures to advance a new Middle East peace plan.

His remarks, underlining his rightist coalition's objections to the peace "road map", were in an interview published as he prepared for talks with the new reformist Palestinian premier later this week and US President George W Bush on May 20.

It was Sharon's second rebuff to US Secretary of State Colin Powell's requests for confidence-building measures, and was quickly condemned by Palestinian officials.

Israel eased a travel ban on Palestinians on Sunday in a move it touted as a humanitarian gesture in response to Powell's appeals, only to seal off the Gaza Strip again on Monday.

Sharon, a longtime patron of settlers on land Israel seized in the 1967 Middle East war, told the Jerusalem Post newspaper that all Israeli governments had pursued settlements in some form in the past, even during periods of peace diplomacy. "In my mind this is not an issue on the horizon right now."

Palestinian negotiations minister Saeb Erekat responded: "It is the main issue on the horizon. The road map says clearly that all settlement activities must end in the first phase. Either Israel accepts the road map with its integrity or they don't."

Palestinian Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas's new government has endorsed the road map and voiced dismay that Powell had not persuaded Sharon to do the same. Powell, who has said scrapping settlement outposts would help calm the atmosphere for diplomacy, asked both sides to begin implementing the road map. But each demanded the other move first on the critical security front.

Sharon refused to ease the military clampdown on West Bank towns, a step Palestinians say would give them leverage to rein in militants.

After meetings with Powell, Israel agreed to free 180 of some 5,000 detainees and let in 25,000 banned Palestinian workers. Palestinians dismissed the gestures as cosmetic.

Sharon denied feeling pressure from the Bush administration, despite its public calls for a suspension of settlement activity as well as a halt to Palestinian attacks.

"It is not something today that anyone is dealing with. All the descriptions about the pressures [over settlements] there is no pressure from anyone," he said.

Sharon said in another published interview a month ago that Israel "would have to part" with some settlements to achieve peace. But he told the Post he had been misinterpreted, saying settlements he mentioned were not "candidates" for withdrawal.