[IWAR] PALESTINE Netanyahu pursues campaign against PLO office inJerusalem (fwd)

[Sana Kirja <waste@zor.hut.fi>]

Jews pissing on the PLO and arabs again...

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: 7Pillars Partners <partners@sirius.infonex.com>
Reply-To: iwar@sirius.infonex.com

Netanyahu pursues campaign against PLO office in Jerusalem

     JERUSALEM, April 22 (AFP) - Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu,
     struggling to make the battle for Jerusalem a central theme of his
     flagging reelection campaign, ordered Thursday the closure of offices
     in Orient House, the unofficial PLO headquarters in the city.
     
     Netanyahu took the decision in reaction to a meeting Wednesday at
     Orient House between Palestinian officials and Arab diplomats which
     he claimed violated agreements barring Palestinian Authority activity
     in Jerusalem.
     
     Palestinian officials immediately denounced the move as a campaign
     ploy by the right-wing premier and said any attempt to close down
     part of Orient House, technically a private residence, would be
     illegal.
     
     A statement issued by Netanyahu's office accused Yasser Arafat's
     Palestinian Authority of engaging in "a series of provocative
     actions" at Orient House capped by Wednesday's meeting between Faisal
     Husseini, the top PLO official in Jerusalem, and four Arab diplomats
     based in Gaza City.
     
     Public Security Minister Avigdor Kahalani was instructed to issue
     closure orders against "offices of the Palestinian Authority located
     in Orient House," it said, without specifying which offices would be
     targetted.
     
     "Measures will also be taken against persons acting for the
     Palestinian Authority in Orient House in violation of the law and of
     (peace) agreements, it said, without elaborating.
     
     Orient House has been used as a base of operations for local
     Palestinian leaders in Jersualem since before the 1993 Oslo peace
     accords which created the Palestinian Authority.
     
     It includes offices for welfare organizations serving east
     Jerusalem's Palestinian residents, Palestinian advisors for
     international aid organizations and various research groups.
     
     "This is sheer propaganda ... there are no Palestinian Authority
     offices in Orient House," said Hanan Ashrawi, a Palestinian lawmaker
     representing east Jerusalem, in response to the Israeli decision.
     
     "Netanyahu is clutching at straws in his election campaign ... he is
     bent on demonstrating that Jerusalem is occupied territory," she told
     AFP.
     
     Under the Oslo peace accords, the Palestinian autonomy administration
     is authorized to operate only in agreed parts of the West Bank and
     Gaza Strip.
     
     The political status of east Jerusalem, which Israel captured in 1967
     and later annexed as part of its capital, was to be resolved in
     future negotiations.
     
     The Palestinians hope to make east Jerusalem the capital of a state
     of their own.
     
     Wednesday's meeting, hosted by Husseini, was his second encounter
     with foreign diplomats at Orient House in a month and represented a
     pre-election embarrassment for Netanyahu, who claims to have ended
     Palestinian political activity in Jerusalem.
     
     After last month's meeting, the government imposed travel
     restrictions on Husseini, Ashrawi and a third Palestinian official.
     
     This month it closed the offices of two Palestinian charities
     operating in east Jerusalem but not from Orient House on the grounds
     they represented the Palestinian Authority.
     
     Netanyahu, who is lagging in opinion polls behind his main rival for
     the prime ministership, Labor Party chief Ehud Barak, has tried to
     make an alleged Palestinian threat to Israeli sovereignty over
     Jerusalem a central theme of his reelection campaign.
     
     He claims that Barak, if elected, would give east Jerusalem to the
     Palestinians.
     
     Barak's campaign platform pledges to maintain all of Jerusalem under
     Israeli sovereignty.
     
     In his successful 1996 campaign for election, Netanyahu assailed the
     then-Labor government for failing to crack down on political activity
     at Orient House and threatened if elected to close the building if
     such activity continued.
     
     Israeli security officials have warned that closing Orient House
     outright could spark violent protests.