1. BUSH—SHARON MEETING SET… U.S. President George W. Bush will welcome Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to the White House today for talks on the “Road Map for Peace.” The meeting follows a similar session between Mr. Bush and Mahmoud ‘Abbas, the Palestinian Authority’s prime minister, last Friday. The issue of the security fence that Israel is building as a defense against terrorist infiltrations has emerged as the single greatest point of friction between the two nations. National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice said yesterday after meeting with Sharon that talks on the matter will continue. It is believed that Mr. Sharon will tell President Bush that he will hold off on one particularly controversial leg of the construction: where it skirts east of the city of Ariel to include the post-1967 community. A White House spokesman praised Sharon’s controversial decision to release hundreds of prisoners belonging to the Hamas and Islamic Jihad terror groups, saying that it “facilitate(s) progress toward peace.”
2. BODY OF MISSING SOLDIER FOUND NEAR ARAB VILLAGES… The body of Oleg Shaihat was found buried in an olive grove between two Arab villages one week after the soldier was reported missing. Shaihat had been traveling from his army base in Safed (Tzfat) to his Upper Nazareth home but was reported missing after he failed to arrive. Israeli security sources believe that Shaihat was killed by Palestinians, whom Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz said murdered the 20-year old “in cold blood.” There have been calls by Palestinian groups to kidnap Israelis to use as bargaining chips to obtain the release of prisoners being held by Israel.
3. ATTACKS CONTINUE… An Israeli vehicle came under attack as it drove near the Jewish community of Yitzhar in post-1967 territory on Monday night. An 11-year old girl was injured in the shooting and taken to a nearby hospital. In other incidents, several bombs were discovered and disposed of safely in several areas. A roadside bomb was defused in the area of Kibbutz Merav, near Mt. Gilboa in the north of Israel, and two more devices were found during a search following its discovery. A large bomb and several smaller charges were also discovered in a Palestinian village near Jenin.
4. “BLACK HEBREWS” GRANTED ISRAELI RESIDENCY STATUS… The Ministry of Interior has granted permanent residency status to the community of Black Hebrews. The group has been in Israel since 1969, and is comprised of about 2,000 black Americans that believe they are descendants of a lost tribe of Israel. Their new status will allow them to serve in the Israeli Army and establish residential communities. They are presently located in the southern desert town of Dimona.
5. SAUDIS ANGRY AT AMERICAN SEPTEMBER 11TH REPORT… The Saudis are reportedly furious over a newly-released report on the September 11th terror attacks that links Saudi Arabia to those attacks. Foreign Minister Prince Sa’ud Al-Fay’sal will fly to Washington to tell it to President Bush himself. The American administration blacked out twenty-eight pages of the report on the grounds of security, and the Saudis are saying that it was because there is no substantiation of the charges. The French news agency AFP reports that the deleted section deals with the specific information about Saudi Arabia’s “failure to clamp down on the Al-Qa’ida terror network.” Fifteen of the nineteen hijackers that attacked the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon in Washington were Saudi citizens.
6. ISRAELI INTEREST RATES CUT BUT REMAIN HIGHEST IN WEST… The new cut in interest rates announced by the Bank of Israel still leaves Israel with a real interest rate of 5%, the highest among Western nations. The key lending rate is 7.0%. The Bank cautioned that the long term interest rate will not fall enough to encourage investment and economic growth due to the size of the deficit that still is double the government guidelines.