- Title: EGYPT: ISRAELI AND ARAB LEADERS MEET IN CAIRO TO REVIVE MIDDLE EAST PEACE TALKS
- Date: 2nd February 1995
- Summary: CAIRO, EGYPT (FEBRUARY 2, 1995) REUTERS TELEVISION - ACCESS ALL 1. SV/ZOOM OUT PALESTINE LIBERATION ORGANISATION (PLO) CHAIRMAN YASSER ARAFAT DISEMBARKING FROM PLANE/ SHAKING HANDS WITH WELCOMING PARTY (5 SHOTS) 0.24 2. SV ARAFAT GETS INTO CAR 0.30 3. MCU PALESTINIAN FLAG ON CAR 0.32 4. SV/PAN CAR DRIVES OFF 0.39
- Embargoed: 17th February 1995 12:00
- Keywords:
- Location: CAIRO, EGYPT
- City:
- Country: Egypt
- Reuters ID: LVA9SR73UDTRPP427GQS0QA9RZHJ
- Story Text: The leaders of Israel, Egypt, Jordan and the Palestinians opened historic talks in Cairo on Thursday (February 2) to try and breathe new life into the faltering Middle East peace process.
Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak has often mediated between Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Palestinian Liberation Organisation (PLO) leader Yasser Arafat but Thursday's summit was the first to bring them together with King Hussein of Jordan.
All three visiting leaders had private talks with Mubarak shortly after their arrivals and later met together over iftar, the ritual meal at sunset ending the Moslem fast in the holy month of Ramadan, which started in Egypt on Wednesday.
Ramadan is a month of peace for Moslems and Rabin's presence at such a ritual is widely seen as a strong message of acceptance of the Israeli leader by his Moslem neighbours, a gesture that would have been unthinkable only two years ago.
Egyptian newspapers called the meeting "a summit to save the peace" while Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres said he expected the talks to redraw the political map of the Middle East and build a "coalition for peace" between Israel and the three Arab parties that have so far made peace with the Jewish state.
Rabin, who arrived in Cairo shortly after Arafat, told veterans of his Labor party in Israel before he left that he would demand that the PLO do more to stop Palestinian attacks on Israelis.
Israel, which has recently suffered a wave of suicide bombings carried out by Moslem militants, says the Palestinian Authority is not doing enough to stop terror attacks. In response Israel has closed off the occupied territories completely, denying Palestinians entry into Israel.
The Palestinian Authority claims that the closure of the territories is a measure of collective punishment and is hurting the Palestinians economically.
Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank have also caused a furore among Palestinians, as settlements are being expanded on land claimed by Arabs.
In May 1994, Israel turned over control of most of the Gaza Strip and the West Bank town of Jericho to Palestinian self-rule under the 1993 peace deal. The agreement calls for the expansion of self-rule to other parts of the West Bank, captured by Israel since the 1967 Middle East war. More than 100,000 Jews live in settlements scattered among more than a million West Bank Arabs.
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