An Artful Deal in Ramallah

The Bush administration’s sharpened focus on the Middle East has produced its first breakthrough, an artful compromise that frees Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat in exchange for letting U.S. and British monitors keep guard over six men wanted by Israel and holed up with Arafat.

The release of Arafat will reduce pressure on Egypt, Jordan and Saudi Arabia from their pro-Palestinian residents, and it is up to them to encourage and pressure Arafat and his allies to end their terror attacks. The White House must also keep up pressure on Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to continue withdrawing troops and resolve a church standoff in Bethlehem.

The agreement regarding Arafat’s headquarters in Ramallah calls for British and American guards to ensure the confinement of five Palestinians accused of assassinating Israel’s tourism minister last October and a sixth who is accused in the attempted smuggling of a shipload of arms into Palestinian territory. The men will be taken from Arafat’s compound and jailed in a Palestinian lockup. Arafat, in return, gets to leave the battered compound where he has been penned by Israeli troops since December.

Israel yielded to U.S. pressure after weeks of ignoring President Bush’s demands that it immediately withdraw troops from reoccupied Palestinian territories. Arab nations interpreted the defiance as either U.S. unwillingness or inability to influence Sharon, even after Secretary of State Colin L. Powell’s trip to the region. The crown prince of Saudi Arabia, a major supplier of oil to the United States, visited Bush’s Texas ranch last week and warned that Washington had to do more to rein in Israel or risk destabilizing the region.

The Ramallah deal is only a start. Another siege continues at the historic Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, where Israel says Palestinian men wanted for various offenses have taken refuge, along with civilians and Eastern Orthodox church staff members. Israel has offered the wanted men a choice of trial by Israel or exile, but Palestinian negotiators insist that the men be allowed to stay in Palestinian territory. Eastern Orthodox Christians will celebrate their Easter this Sunday, and it is symbolically important for negotiators to resolve the impasse before then.

Israel also should allow U.N. fact-finders to investigate the killings in the Palestinian refugee camp in Jenin. Foreign Minister Shimon Peres said more than a week ago that Israel would accept the investigators, but Israel keeps adding conditions and objecting to the makeup of the team. Israel has long distrusted the United Nations, with good reason. Radical nations engineered the U.N. declaration that Zionism is a form of racism a quarter-century ago and raised the topic at a U.N. conference last year. Israel also has valid questions about how the Jenin camp became a refuge for Palestinian terrorists even though it is administered by the U.N. But the addition of military experts to the investigating team should satisfy many objections. It will benefit Israel to let the investigators try to determine what happened in Jenin.

Outsiders need to pull Israelis and Palestinians apart and keep applying pressure to end the violence. The U.S., helped by Britain and Saudi Arabia, has made a good start. All parties need to press forward without hesitation.