Middle East: Arab foreign ministers meeting in Algiers on Saturday rejected a Jordanian proposal to soften the long-standing Arab approach to Israel by calling for normalisation without mentioning conditions previously set.
Consequently, Arab kings and presidents meeting there tomorrow and Wednesday are likely to approve the Saudi proposal adopted at the March 2002 summit in Beirut. Although the text is being referred to as a revision of the Jordanian proposal, Jordan's King Abdullah II said he would not attend the summit. Lebanese president Emile Lahoud will also be absent due to the crisis in his country.
The Saudi plan, put forward by Crown Prince Abdullah, the effective ruler of the kingdom, offered Israel full normalisation with Arab states in exchange for full Israeli withdrawal from Arab territory occupied in 1967, including East Jerusalem, the West Bank, Gaza Strip and Syria's Golan Heights. Israel was also to agree to the establishment of a Palestinian state and the resolution of the Palestinian refugee problem.
Analysts argue that the omission by Jordan's king of these conditions suggested that he wanted the Arabs to accept the demographic changes Israel has made in the occupied territories since 1967 through the settlement of more than half-a-million Israelis in the Palestinian territories and Syrian Golan.
Thirteen of the 22 league members were, reportedly, prepared to agree. But nine, including Syria, Lebanon, Algeria and the Palestinians, rejected the proposal.
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