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Bush hopes to meet with Sharon, Abbas in Egypt
From John King
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The White House is trying to arrange a meeting between President Bush, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Palestinian Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas in early June in Egypt, Bush administration officials said Thursday. The officials stressed the meeting was not a certainty, but one official said it was looking "more and more likely." The site under consideration for the three-way meeting is the Egyptian resort town of Sharm el-Sheik, which has been the setting for several major meetings on the Mideast peace process. The White House has been trying to arrange such a three-way meeting since Sharon postponed his trip to Washington where he was to meet with Bush last Tuesday about the so-called road map to Mideast peace, which calls for an end to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and establishment of an independent Palestinian state by 2005. Sharon postponed that meeting after a series of deadly suicide bombings in Israel. Bush is traveling to Europe next week with scheduled stops in Poland, Russia, and France. He is also considering other possible stops in the Middle East to visit U.S. military personnel, officials said. If the arrangements for the Bush-Sharon-Abbas summit are completed, it would be held a day or two after the conclusion of the annual G-8 summit in Evian, France, which ends June 3. The framework for the meeting is essentially in place, said one official, but is contingent upon a period of calm in the region. The Bush administration has been asking the Palestinians to improve security, and Sharon has told the White House he would not attend a meeting if major violence continues in Israel. Word of the proposed summit came hours after Israeli sources said a Hezbollah bomb maker and computer disks containing information "necessary to carry out terrorist attacks" were found aboard a fishing boat seized by the Israeli navy off the coast of Lebanon earlier this week. (Full story) Palestinian PM meets with HamasAmid international calls for tough action to combat mounting Mideast violence, Abbas met Thursday with leaders of Hamas in Gaza, Palestinian sources said. Hamas, an Islamic fundamentalist group, has been labeled by the U.S. State Department as a terrorist organization. Abbas' meeting with Hamas lasted approximately two hours. Afterward, both sides said the talks will continue. Sources told CNN that Hamas leaders had suggested a conditional cease-fire similar to past proposals by the group -- it stops attacks on Israelis if Israel stops operations in the Palestinian territories. Israel has rejected that proposal in the past. Hamas' military wing, Izzedine al Qassam, has claimed responsibility for three of five suicide bombings in Israel and Palestinian territories from Saturday through Monday. Islamic Jihad and the al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades have claimed responsibility for one of the attacks. There has been no claim of responsibility for the fifth bombing. Three of those attacks resulted in the deaths of 11 Israelis and one Palestinian. Sharon called the bombings "a clear declaration of war by the Islamic radical groups." The first bombing Saturday coincided with a meeting in Jerusalem between Abbas and Sharon. The nearly three-hour talks Saturday night about the road map was the first time top Palestinian and Israeli leaders had met in two and a half years. Abbas and Palestinian Authority Security Minister Mohammed Dahlan have indicated in the past they would confront Hamas and other Islamic extremist groups which refuse to suspend armed struggle against Israeli targets. Bush spoke with Abbas and Sharon by phone on Tuesday. White House spokesman Ari Fleischer said Bush considered the call to Abbas "friendly and hopeful" and told Sharon he believed the Palestinian "is a reformer who wants peace." Abbas' campaign for prime minister was contentious -- in part -- because Abbas and Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat disagreed about whether Dahlan would be included in the new Palestinian Authority Cabinet as minister for security. Eventually, in an Egyptian-brokered deal, Abbas was able to give the post to Dahlan, the former Palestinian chief of security for Gaza. Arafat was said to be angry because he believed Dahlan would acquiesce to Israeli and U.S. efforts to sideline him as Palestinian leader, high-level sources in the Palestinian Authority told CNN. Dahlan promised to support Abbas in a confrontation with Hamas and Islamic Jihad if their refusal to end attacks against Israelis threatened to block international peace efforts, Palestinian sources said. On April 29, just hours after Abbas was confirmed as prime minister, a suicide bomber blew himself up at the door of an Israeli beachfront cafe in Tel Aviv, killing three people and wounding dozens of others. Israeli radio reported that Izzedine al Qassam and the al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades both claimed responsibility.
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