Israeli and Palestinian leaders tried to set aside their differences Friday and called for restraint in the most determined attempt yet to end five weeks of bloodshed.
But despite efforts by both sides to curb the unrest, three Palestinian protesters, including one who died later of his wounds, were killed and dozens were injured in clashes with Israeli soldiers in the West Bank and Gaza Strip on Friday as the drumbeat of violence slowed only slightly. Four Israeli soldiers were also hurt, the army said.
Some Israeli and Palestinian officials raised mutual doubts that their fragile cease-fire would hold.
In Washington, the Clinton administration worked on a post-election series of meetings, possibly as early as next week, that would bring Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak and Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat to the White House. The Israeli and Palestinian leaders would not meet each other but would confer separately with President Clinton.
“The president hopes to meet both leaders in Washington in the very near future,” said White House spokesman P.J. Crowley. “We expect the leaders to come to Washington at separate times, but the specific dates have not yet been set.”
In Jerusalem, Israeli officials complained that the Palestinians had failed to come forward, as required by a deal the two sides reached on Thursday, with a strongly worded public statement calling for an end to the violence.
The Israelis also said they wanted to hear and see Arafat make the statement.
But the Palestinians said they had already lived up to their part of the agreement with a publicly issued statement that was broadcast over the Voice of Palestine, the broadcasting arm of the Palestinian Authority.
The Palestinians added that they wanted Israeli tanks withdrawn from all of the besieged Arab communities in the West Bank and Gaza Strip and an end to the encirclement of a number of cities and villages–steps they said the Israelis had promised to carry out.
Yet, despite the public sparring, both sides said that the other appeared to be taking steps to carry out the truce and end the violence. More than 165 people, most of them Palestinians, have died since the intifada or uprising began.
The Israelis said that they had withdrawn some of their tanks and lifted some curfew orders. But curfews were enforced for Hebron and other communities.
Meanwhile, the Israelis credited the Palestinian police with curtailing stone-throwing and a march by about 200 Palestinians near the Western Wall in the Old City of Jerusalem.
Fearful of an outburst of violence at the Friday prayers held at the Al Aqsa Mosque, Jerusalem’s streets were flooded with police and other security personnel and the Israelis barred any men under 45 from praying at the Islamic shrine.
Many Palestinians were turned away from the mosque, and large numbers joined in a mass prayer in the streets nearby. As a result of the age limit, an estimated 5,000 took part in the prayers, a significant drop from the more than 50,000 who usually attend the Friday services.
Frustrated by their failure to regain access for huge crowds to the mosque, Palestinians have been searching for ways to overcome the Israeli clampdown that has been in place for the last five weeks.
In a speech at a ceremony marking the fifth anniversary of the assassination of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, Barak said he has not given up hope for peace with the Palestinians.
He warned, however, that Israel has not yet seen the worst of the current crisis.
“There are no bang-and-it’s-over solutions,” Barak told Israel Television. He said Israel would not “act impulsively or out of a moment’s rage.”
Barak was apparently alluding to some Israeli leaders’ demands for a swift and powerful attack on the Palestinians in retaliation for the car bomb that exploded Thursday in Jerusalem, killing two Israelis and injuring 10 others.
The bombing near the crowded Mahane Yehuda produce market in the heart of Jerusalem, the sixth terrorist attack there in the last 32 years, took place just as the two sides were preparing to put their truce into place.
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Islamic Jihad, one of several militant Islamic groups that have vowed to sabotage any peace with the Israelis, claimed responsibility for the bombing.
Amid the widening cycle of violence and Israelis’ growing uncertainty about living beside the more than 3 million Palestinians, the memorial for Rabin, the man viewed by many Israelis as the architect for peace, appears to have taken on a special meaning.
Throughout Friday, Israeli radio stations played songs of peace, many of them linked with Rabin’s efforts to broker an end to the conflict.
Thousands of Israelis are expected to attend a memorial service for Rabin on Saturday night at the same Tel Aviv square where he was assassinated by a militant Israeli.
The Clinton administration, meanwhile, has been pressing the Israelis and Palestinians to stick to the commitments they made at the summit last month in Sharm el-Sheik, Egypt.
Secretary of State Madeleine Albright emphasized the point Wednesday at a meeting with Israeli Foreign Minister Shlomo Ben-Ami and again Friday at the State Department with Saeb Erekat, one of Arafat’s top negotiators.
“Both parties need to take the steps that they agreed to,” said State Department spokesman Richard Boucher.
Crowley said, “There are indications that both sides are taking steps on the ground consistent with the understanding reached at Sharm.”
In the talks in Egypt and earlier in Paris, Israeli and Palestinian leaders agreed to mutual public calls to end the violence, a pullback of forces and cooperation on security issues.
Erekat, who also met at the White House with National Security Adviser Samuel “Sandy” Berger, announced that the Palestinian leader would come to Washington.
“President Arafat accepted the invitation to come to Washington,” Erekat said. “There will not be a three-way meeting.”
Arafat was tentatively planning to be in Washington next Wednesday, with Barak to follow later in the week. The Israeli prime minister is scheduled to speak to a conference of Jewish leaders in Chicago on Nov. 12. No dates for White House meetings had been set.
The Palestinians are pushing the idea of a United Nations buffer force that would keep Israeli soldiers and Palestinian protesters apart. Israel vehemently opposes any such idea as an infringement on its sovereignty, and the Clinton administration has stuck with Israel’s position.
“The United States has consistently had reservations or been opposed to these proposals,” Boucher said. “This is going to be solved in the region and not outside.”
But the violence that has erupted between Israelis and Palestinians has undercut the usually solid U.S. hold on the peace process. UN Secretary General Kofi Annan has become much more active in a mediator’s role and the Palestinians, in particular, seem to be growing impatient with what they view as Washington’s tilt toward Israel.
Even Egypt, one of the largest recipients of U.S. foreign aid, is open to inviting other participants, including the UN, to the peace table.