Israel offers to pull troops back from West Bank and Gaza

Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon repeated his offer last night to pull back troops from the West Bank and Gaza Strip, but only if the Palestinians rein in the militant groups.

Sharon’s comments during a meeting with Palestinian Premier Mahmoud Abbas set a guarded but optimistic tone for next week’s three way summit with US President George Bush.

The two leaders were discussing the US-backed road map to Mideast peace, which envisions a Palestinian state existing alongside Israel by 2005.

The Palestinians demanded a freeze on Israeli settlements in the West Bank and Gaza, but the Israelis say that all the steps laid out in the plan are contingent on a crackdown on the Palestinian terror groups.

Palestinian Foreign Minister Nabil Shaath said this depended on “reaching an agreement on a ceasefire with Hamas and the other Palestinian groups. Now we will try our best to reach this agreement ... and I am optimistic.”

Hamas and another militant group Islamic Jihad yesterday held out the prospect of a truce if the Israeli military would halt its campaign against them.

Hamas has been responsible for most of the suicide bombings that have killed more than 300 Israelis in 32 months of violence.

Last night’s three hour talks were the second between Sharon and Abbas in two weeks.

The meetings are setting the stage for the crucial summit with Bush on Wednesday in the Jordanian resort of Aqaba.

The Palestinians are demanding Israel make a clear statement endorsing their right to a state at that meeting.

Declarations by each side recognising the rights of the other to statehood and security are supposed to be the first step of the road map.

In a statement after last night’s meeting at Sharon’s Jerusalem office, Israel said it would cancel a two week closure on the West Bank and Gaza that had idled Palestinians who work in Israel.

The Israelis said they would allow 25,000 Palestinians to return to their jobs.

Also, the Israelis said they would release some Palestinian prisoners, without giving numbers.

The statement did not say when the measures would be taken. Sharon aide Raanan Gissin said only: “We will do it in a very short period.”

It said that if the Palestinians eliminate terrorism, Israel would negotiate a peace agreement according to principles set down in a Bush speech last June, “in which framework it will be agreed to establish a provisional Palestinian state and afterwards a permanent state.”

Israel’s government prefers to link its policy to the Bush speech, rather than the road map, because it objects to some of the wording in the plan, which was sponsored by the European Union, Russia and the United Nations along with the US.

After the meeting, the Palestinian participants returned to the West Bank town of Ramallah to brief Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat.

He said he would convene a meeting of the PLO executive to review the results of the talks.

Israel and the US have been trying to sideline Arafat, banning meetings of their officials with him, charging that he is involved in Palestinian terrorism.

Arafat only grudgingly appointed Abbas last month as the first Palestinian prime minister under stiff international pressure.