THE Israeli Prime Minister, Mr Benjamin Netanyahu, and the Palestinian President, Mr Yasser Arafat, said they agreed at a summit yesterday to resolve, in joint committees, outstanding issues of the Hebron peace accord.
"The committees will meet. . . on Sunday," Mr Netanyahu told reporters after the meeting. "I think this is a promising continuation of the Hebron agreement and we are continuing in that spirit of co operation to resolve all our outstanding problems and matters."
Mr Netanyahu is preparing for a trip to the United States this week. His office said a special cabinet meeting would be held today before his talks with President Clinton on Thursday.
Mr Netanyahu and Mr Arafat met for an hour and 40 minutes at the Erez border crossing between Israel and Gaza for talks that officials said earlier would focus on expanding self rule and the operation of Palestinian sea and air ports.
Emerging from the talks, Mr Arafat told reporters the committees would start discussing within a week, details of further peace steps outlined in the US brokered accord under which 80 per cent of Hebron was handed over to PLO rule.
David Horovitz reports from Jerusalem: As Israel prepares to free the last two dozen female Palestinian prisoners from its jails including two convicted of involvement in the murder of Israelis, calls are growing for the "parallel" releases of up to 20 Jewish convicts for murder and other "nationalist" attacks on Arabs.
The Supreme Court yesterday issued a temporary injunction against the Palestinian releases, pending a hearing this morning, but Mr Netanyahu told his ministers on Friday that the women would be freed this week, in accordance with the Hebron accord. He repeated the commitment last night, at the meeting with Mr Arafat.
The women were supposed to have been freed more than a year ago under previous Israeli Palestinian agreements, but all chose to stay in jail when the president, Mr, Ezer Weizman, and an army commander, whose signatures were required for the releases to proceed, refused to sanction the freeing of five prisoners with Israeli blood on their hands.
Mr Weizman has since lifted his objections and the Supreme Court is thought unlikely to block the move today.