ISRAEL: Softening his campaign rhetoric, the front-runner in the elections for a new head of the Palestinian Authority, Mr Mahmoud Abbas, said yesterday he hoped negotiations with Israel would resume after Sunday's vote and that he did not rule out Prime Minister Ariel Sharon as a partner for peace.
Mr Abbas is viewed in Israel and the west as a moderate and a pragmatist, having long called for the cessation of attacks on Israel.
In Nablus, he repeated this theme, saying that "resistance is a Palestinian right," but that "peaceful means" were "more useful".
There were reports last night that Mr Abbas had secured the agreement of the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, an armed group associated with his ruling Fatah party, to conduct ceasefire negotiations with Israel.
Mr Sharon, meanwhile, is facing growing opposition to his Gaza withdrawal plan from Jewish settlers, with an increasing number of officers and soldiers who live in settlements saying they will refuse to carry out evacuation orders.
Fearing widespread refusal, Defence Minister Shaul Mofaz yesterday warned that officers who refuse to carry out orders would be stripped of their rank. Army chief Lieut Gen Moshe Ya'alon said soldiers who refused to participate in the withdrawal would be expelled from the military.