Just prior to the arrival of US Secretary of State
Condoleezza Rice, Israel is to release 198 Palestinian prisoners as a goodwill
gesture to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, a government statement Sunday
said.
The release to take place Monday follows a cabinet decision of one week ago and
includes two prisoners "with blood on their hands" - Israeli
terminology for prisoners who have killed Israelis, and who Israel has
previously refused to include in prisoners deals with the Palestinians.
People in the West Bank began to prepare for their relatives' release. Outside
the home of a prisoner in Ramallah, the family hung Palestinian national flags
and the yellow flags of Abbas' Fatah party, and set up a tent to receive visitors.
The prisoners will be released as the US Secretary of State is due to arrive
for a visit to the region, during which she will meet Israeli and Palestinian
officials and gauge the progress of the Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations,
which resumed around the turn of the year.
Rice, set to arrive Monday afternoon, will first meet separately with the heads
of the negotiating teams, Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni and the former
Palestinian prime minister Ahmed Qureia, ahead of a three-way meeting the next
day.
She will also meet Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in Jerusalem on Tuesday
morning and later with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in Ramallah,
officials said.
The Jerusalem Post daily quoted "diplomatic officials" Sunday as saying
Livni would be unlikely to agree if Rice asked the sides to prepare a document,
to be presented to the United Nations, outlining the progress made in the talks
so far.
According to the daily, Livni is concerned any document making public the
contents of the talks with the Palestinians would complicate her efforts to be
elected leader of the ruling Kadima party.
The primaries are scheduled for September 17, the day before Rice wants to
present the document to the UN.
Livni heads the Israeli team in the talks. If elected Kadima leader, she would
have to form a new government, or failing that, lead the party into new
elections.
Any paper detailing what concessions, if any, she had offered the Palestinians
could have a negative impact.
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Abbas agreed at last year's Annapolis
peace summit to try and secure a peace deal by the end of 2008.
The negotiations are being conducted amid a virtual media blackout, with
conflicting accounts of what progress, if any, has been made.
But officials from both sides have begun intimating that the end- of-year
deadline may have been optimistic.
Rice, however, said during her previous trip to the region, in June, that she
thought the target date could still be met.
The secretary of state has made 20 visits to Israel and the Palestinian areas during her term of office, dpa
reported.
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