The meetings will probably be followed by a summit meeting with U.S. President George Bush, but it was not clear whether it would be held in Jordan's port city of Aqaba, or in Egypt's Sharm al-Sheikh in the southern tip of the Sinai peninsula, two sources, including an aide to Israeli Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom, told UPI.
Israel's Channel 1, 2 and 10 TV stations said one summit meeting would be held in Aqaba with Bush and Jordan's King Abdullah. The following day Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak will host the four in Sharm al-Sheikh. Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Morocco will also be represented in Sharm al-Sheikh, Channel 10 said. Officials, however, described these reports as "rumors" and talk of two summit meetings as "chatter."
The flurry of activity comes one day after the Israeli government reluctantly agreed to implement the steps in a "road map" for peace that the Quartet (the United States, the United Nations, the European Union and Russia) presented.
The Palestinians accepted the "road map" immediately after it was presented on April 30.
A public opinion poll published in the Israel Yediot Aharonot newspaper Monday indicated 56 percent of the respondents supported the government's decision, 34 percent opposed it, and 10 percent were undecided.
Israel hawks slammed the government. Graffiti accused Tourism Minister Benny Elon, of the hawkish National Union, of being "a traitor" since he is staying in the Cabinet. Elon voted against the plan.
Some National Union members called for quitting the coalition. However, Deputy Education Minister Zvi Hendel, of that faction, said they could disrupt the plan more effectively if they stay in the government.
Legislators belonging to Sharon's Likud Party gave him a tough time at the faction's meeting in the Knesset.
"The road to hell is filled with good intentions," Knesset Member Michael Ratson told Sharon. "This document is hellish. It signals Israel's surrender to Palestinian terror."
"This signals Israel's destruction," Knesset member Yehiel Hazan, a resident of the West Bank settlement of Ariel, told UPI.
At the faction meeting, Hazan asked the prime minister: "Could I build a house for my son in Ariel where he was born?" The "road map" calls for a complete freeze on settlement activity, including natural growth, but Sharon opposes that key provision of the plan.
"You definitely can (build) and there are no restrictions," the prime minister answered. You can build for your children, grandchildren, and I hope for your great-grandchildren."
Former Foreign Minister David Levy slammed Sharon for accepting a document that "combines all the bad things that ever existed. If it will end with (an Israel withdrawal) to the 1967 lines, some people will be amazed that this is where it stops," Levy said. Israel occupied the West Bank and the Gaza Strip in 1967.
Raising the document to eye level Levy charged: "It gives up everything."
Sharon, occasionally thumping his fingers for emphasis, insisted "Israel must make every effort to reach a political settlement ... up to the point where it endangers its security. ... This is the historical responsibility that I feel.""
Since 1967, Israel has called the West Bank, "Judea and Samaria," to give it a Jewish, biblical name. Officially it refers to the West Bank and the Gaza Strip as "administered territories" to avoid saying they are occupied.
Monday, Sharon did not mince words. Time and again he stressed the Palestinians are under occupation.
"The idea that it is possible to hold 3.5 million Palestinians under occupation is bad to Israel, to the Palestinians, and Israel's economy," he said.
"Do you want to stay forever in Jenin, Nablus, Ramallah and Bethlehem? Forever? I don't think that's right!"
The prime minister said the peace plan is "a framework, not an agreement. There will be tens, if not hundreds of agreements on various subjects. There is no agreement, yet, on anything."
"We are facing a year, or maybe years of complexities and complications," he added.
Israel balked at many items in the "road map" and Sunday, under heavy U.S. pressure, agreed to implement the steps in the plan, provided its reservations are accepted.
According to the "road map," the Palestinians must "immediately undertake an unconditional cessation of violence," with "visible efforts on the ground to arrest, disrupt and restrain individuals and groups conducting and planning violent attacks on Israelis anywhere."
The Israelis should provide, "supportive measures" and take "all necessary steps to help normalize Palestinian life."
As "comprehensive security performance moves forward," Israel should withdraw from areas it occupied since September 2000.
It has reoccupied all the West Bank towns, except Jericho, and prevents interurban travel.
The plan says that in the first stage of implementation Israel must also dismantle all the settlements erected since March 2001 and freeze all settlement activity.
In subsequent stages, the Palestinians will get a state with temporary borders and by 2005 the parties should settle the toughest issues of borders, the future of Jerusalem, the settlements and the Palestinian demand for a right of return to Israel of refugees who left it in 1948.
The Israelis insist the Palestinians take the first step and clamp down on militants.
Copyright 2003 by United Press International.
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