Clinton sets West Bank schedule

Netanyahu said he and Arafat had achieved a breakthrough on a long-elusive deal over West Bank territory. Clinton said after the three leaders met at the White House, "I believe that we all agreed that we have made progress on the path to peace."

The president described "a significant narrowing of the gaps between the two parties across a wide range of issues."

The new timetable calls for Secretary of State Madeleine Albright and U.S. mediator Dennis Ross to go the region for further talks with the two leaders next week and for Netanyahu and Arafat to return to the White House for a meeting with Clinton in mid-October.

"This process needs to be speeded up," Albright said after the three-way, 90-minute meeting the Oval Office. Netanyahu then returned for a separate meeting with Clinton, and Arafat was due to see the president today.

Albright steered clear of any claims of breakthroughs, telling reporters, "We are very close on a number of subjects," acknowledging that an accord on how much land Israel was willing to relinquish was among them.

But a senior U.S. official later told The Associated Press, "Everybody thinks we broke the back" of that issue and now can focus on other matters.

The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the Mideast leaders had committed themselves to go on from there to negotiations on a final settlement.

Netanyahu, at a news conference before he flew home for the Jewish holy day of Yom Kippur, said, "What we have achieved is to set up a timetable, a path to completion of this process."

He added, "We hope we will complete it by meeting in mid-October in Washington."

Arafat, meanwhile, flew back to New York, where he asked world leaders at the U.N. General Assembly to support Palestinian statehood next May, saying this was the will of the Palestinian people.

"I would like to call upon all of you ... to stand by our people," Arafat said. The Oslo peace accords will expire on May 4, "and our people demand of us to shoulder our responsibilities as they await the establishment of their independent state."

The biggest hurdle, according to Israeli and American diplomats, centers on Israeli demands that the Palestinian Authority dismantle terrorist cells on the West Bank and in Gaza, confiscate weapons and stop freeing apprehended suspects. Also, Netanyahu demands the Palestine Liberation Organization nullify numerous anti-Israel references in its covenant.

Considering that no accord emerged from the White House meeting, Albright was peppered with questions at a news conference why Clinton had staged the three-way meeting.

"Only the president of the United States could give it this sense of urgency," Albright said.

Besides, she said Netanyahu and Arafat had been in New York to attend the special session of the U.N. General Assembly and "it really was a good use of time" to have them come down to Washington to see the president.

Unlike her predecessors over the last quarter-century, Albright has not engaged in shuttle diplomacy to try to prod Arabs and Israel to reach agreements. And she said yesterday that was not her plan now.

Netanyahu, earlier, said on NBC's "Today" program, "I think we're getting close to finalizing an agreement."

Over the weekend, he and several Israeli diplomats said there was a basic understanding that Israel would withdraw from an additional 13 percent of the West Bank, with 3 percent turned into an undeveloped nature preserve under Israel's security control.

In earlier accords, Israel pledged to yield 27 percent and has also surrendered all of Gaza to the Palestinian Authority.

Clinton cautioned that some obstacles remained.

"There is still a substantial amount of work to be done until a comprehensive agreement can be reached," he said.

09-29-98