Powell will tour Israel and region to sell US road-map

The United States is embarking on a diplomatic offensive to support the "road-map" for a Middle East peace settlement by 2005. The plan, drawn up by America, Russia, the European Union and the United Nations, was given yesterday to Ariel Sharon, the Israeli Prime Minister, and Mahmoud Abbas.

Mr Abbas's confirmation on Tuesday as Prime Minister of the Palestinian Authority removed the last obstacle to the publication of the peace plan.

Colin Powell, the US Secretary of State, is expected to arrive in Europe today for a visit to Spain and Albania and will visit Syria and Lebanon at the weekend. Next week, he is to travel to Israel and the occupied territories, where he will throw Washington's weight behind the peace process.

The road-map, considered by many as hugely optimistic, falls into three stages, all to be crammed into little more than 30 months. The first stipulates an end to terrorism, normalisation of Palestinian life, Israeli withdrawal from Palestinian towns and a freeze on settlement activity. The second phase is intended to see the creation of an independent Palestinian state, and Palestinian elections. The third stage will bring about a permanent status agreement, an end to the conflict – and the resolution of issues that have hampered negotiations for decades. These include deals on the final borders of the two states, the fate of Israeli settlements, the right to return of Palestinian refugees and the status of Jerusalem. Arab states, most notably Syria, which General Powell will visit this weekend, will be expected to sign peace treaties.

The success of the road-map depends on the leverage America has acquired in the region after the overthrow of Saddam Hussein's regime. That gave Washington more authority than at any time since the elder President George Bush triumphed in the 1991 Gulf War. The question now is whether his son is ready to use that leverage.

Unrelenting pressure from Washington was what secured the appointment of Mr Abbas to replace President Yasser Arafat, with whom the White House will not deal. By contrast, Mr Abbas has been invited to Washington to meet George Bush, though Ari Fleischer, Mr Bush's spokesman, said yesterday that no date had been established.

But Mr Sharon is a different matter. The Israeli side has let it be known that it regards the road-map as "open to further discussion" and has called for amendments in a dozen areas. Mr Bush pledged his commitment to the plan yesterday. Though he called for a two-state solution to the conflict in 2002, the President has thus far never seriously attempted to confront the Israeli Prime Minister.

For Israel, the road-map is a non-starter unless there is a demonstrable end to terrorist attacks against the Jewish state. Yet barely had the Abbas administration been approved by the Palestinian parliament than a suicide bomber killed himself and two others in an attack on a Tel Aviv nightclub.

Responsibility was claimed by the radical Hamas group and by an offshoot of Mr Arafat's Fatah organisation, prompting Israeli officials to claim that Mr Abbas cannot fulfil his promise to crack down on terrorism.

Mr Sharon has said he is ready to make what he called "painful concessions" as part of a peace deal, and give up some settlements. But Palestinians say there is a marked contrast between Mr Sharon's words and his government's deeds. They have accused Israel of trying to pre-empt the independent Palestinian state. They point to the "security fence" the Israeli government is building and to the continued expansion of Jewish settlements in the occupied territories. They are also concerned about the bypass roads built for the exclusive use of settlers.

The Israeli government says the aim of the security fence is to prevent Palestinian militants from crossing into Israel and launching suicide bombings. But the fence is not following the Green Line, the internationally recognised border. Instead it will cut off about 10 per cent of the West Bank – where the Palestinians want to establish their state. It is all part of a scheme to pre-empt any negotiations on a Palestinian state, according to Dr Jad Isaac of the Applied Research Institute in Jerusalem, an independent Palestinian organisation that obtains commercial satellite images of Israeli construction in the occupied territories.

The Jewish settlers who live in the occupied territories in contravention of international law have never made any secret of the fact that the aim of their presence is to make an Israeli claim to the land and prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state there.

The security fence and the network of bypass roads being built by the Israeli government had the same aim, said Dr Isaac. Using satellite pictures, he showed how the settlements and bypass roads cut off Palestinian population centres in the West Bank from each other and divided the West Bank into cantons. The aim, he says, is to create a situation in which a Palestinian state is only viable within crowded cities isolated from each other.

Although the road-map calls on Israel to put a stop to settlement building and to dismantle settler outposts built since 2001, it does not affect the creation of bypass roads or the security fence. During the war in Iraq, the Israeli government announced controversial route changes for the fence, which will cut huge areas out of the West Bank, to keep major Jewish settlements such as Ariel on the Israeli side.

The route will also put the Jordan valley, the best agricultural land in the West Bank, on the Israeli side.

The Israelis have long argued they want control of the Jordan valley, which borders Jordan, for "security reasons".

Three-phase approach to a lasting settlement

PHASE I:

Ending terror and violence, normalising Palestinian life

The Palestinians immediately undertake an unconditional cessation of violence, with supportive measures undertaken by Israel.

Palestinians and Israelis resume security co-operation based on the Tenet plan to end violence, terrorism, and incitement through restructured and effective Palestinian security services.

Palestinians undertake comprehensive political reform in preparation for statehood, including drafting a constitution, and free, fair and open elections.

Israel takes all necessary steps to help normalise Palestinian life. Israel withdraws from Palestinian areas occupied from 28 September 2000 and the two sides restore the status quo that existed at that time, as security performance and co-operation progress. Israel also freezes all settlement activity, consistent with the Mitchell report.

PHASE 2: TRANSITION

June to December 2003

Efforts are focused on creating an independent Palestinian state with provisional borders and attributes of sovereignty, based on the new constitution, as a way station to a permanent status settlement. This goal can be achieved when the Palestinian people have a leadership acting decisively against terror, willing and able to build a practising democracy based on tolerance and liberty.

PHASE 3: PERMANENT STATUS AGREEMENT AND END OF THE ISRAELI-PALESTINIAN CONFLICT

2004 to 2005

The objectives are consolidation of reform and stabilisation of Palestinian institutions, sustained and effective Palestinian security performance, and Israeli-Palestinian negotiations aimed at a permanent status agreement in 2005.

An international conference will be convened by the Quartet (the US, Russia, EU and the UN) at the beginning of 2004 to endorse agreement reached on an independent Palestinian state with provisional borders and formally to launch a process with the active, sustained, and operational support of the Quartet, leading to a final, permanent status resolution in 2005, including on borders, Jerusalem, refugees, settlements; and, to support progress toward a comprehensive Middle East settlement between Israel and Lebanon and Israel and Syria, to be achieved as soon as possible.

Continued comprehensive, effective progress on the reform agenda and security co-operation, laid out in Phase 1.

International efforts to facilitate reform and stabilise Palestinian institutions and the Palestinian economy, in preparation for final status agreement.

Parties reach final and comprehensive permanent status agreement that ends the Israel-Palestinian conflict in 2005, through a settlement negotiated between the parties based on United Nations Security Council resolutions 242, 338 and 1397, that ends the occupation that began in 1967, and includes an agreed, just, fair, and realistic solution to the refugee issue, and a negotiated resolution on the status of Jerusalem that takes into account the political and religious concerns of both sides, and protects the religious interests of Jews, Christians, and Muslims worldwide, and fulfils the vision of two states, Israel and sovereign, independent, democratic and viable Palestine, living side-by-side in peace and security.

Arab state acceptance of full normal relations with Israel and security for all the states of the region.