WEST BANK/JERUSALEM: ISRAEL CONTINUES TO PULL BACK ITS CHECKPOINTS IN PALESTINIAN TERRITORY.

Record ID: 400315

  • Title: WEST BANK/JERUSALEM: ISRAEL CONTINUES TO PULL BACK ITS CHECKPOINTS IN PALESTINIAN TERRITORY.
  • Date: 11th January 2001
  • Summary: RAFAH, GAZA (JANUARY 11, 2001)(REUTERS - ACCESS ALL) 1. GV/MV: PALESTINIANS GETTING INTO TAXIS, DRIVING AWAY TO EGYPTIAN BORDER (5 SHOTS) 0.21 2. GV: TAXI CARS DRIVING PAST DISMANTLED CHECKPOINTS 0.31 3. GV: LAND-MOVER AND TANK AT CHECKPOINT; CAR PASSING THROUGH CHECKPOINT (3 SHOTS) 1.00 QALQILIYA, WEST BANK (JANUARY 11, 2001)(REUT
  • Embargoed: 26th January 2001 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: RAFAH, GAZA/QALQILYA, WEST BANK/JERUSALEM
  • City:
  • Country: Palestinian Territories
  • Reuters ID: LVAXLWXQXBFI4GD17WQF8UQ7BCL
  • Story Text: Israel is continuing to pull back some checkpoints in
    Palestinian territory as part of a fresh bid to end 16 weeks
    of violent Israeli-Palestinian confrontations.

    Former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has told a news
    conference that he suspects the motives of the Palestinians in
    any peace negotiations.

    And, in a reminder of how elusive Middle East peace
    remains, a bomb was found and defused shortly before it was
    set to go off in an ultra-Orthodox residential section of
    Jerusalem.



    The Israeli army relaxed security restrictions in some
    Palestinian areas on Thursday (January 11) in steps to end 16
    weeks of violence that have so far blocked U.S. President Bill
    Clinton's last-gasp peace bid.

    The moves followed joint security talks late on Wednesday
    where Israel said Palestinian negotiators agreed to reduce the
    violence in which at least 360 people have died.

    Roadblocks were removed at a checkpoint near the Jewish
    settlement of Netzarim in Gaza, allowing Palestinian cars to
    move along the road for the first time in weeks.

    Israeli soldiers also removed roadblocks near the West
    Bank town of Qalqiliya and Palestinian police said Israel had
    reopened Rafah terminal, the border between Gaza and Egypt.

    But they said a heavy Israeli security presence stayed in
    place in other Palestinian areas.

    Meanwhile, former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told a
    news conference in Jerusaelm that he fears that the
    Palestinians are only going along with any peace process for
    their own ends.

    "You can make peace with an enemy, but only with an enemy
    that wants to make peace," said Netanyahu.

    "An enemy that uses the peace process merely to advance
    his war of annihilating you in stages is not a partner in
    peace."
    And an apparent pipebomb located in a Jewish residential
    area of Jerusalem drove home the point that peace is not yet
    at hand.

    A 20-year-old man found a suspicious object attached to a
    mobile telephone in a trash bin in an ultra-Orthodox
    neighbourhood.

    He unplugged electronic connections from the object to the
    phone just shortly before the phone rang, possibly indicating
    that a remote-controlled pipe bomb could have exploded a short
    time later.

    Israeli authorities arrived at the scene to further search
    the area.
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