Nazir Majally, Asharq Al-Awsat

OCCUPIED JERUSALEM, 14 December 2003 — A Palestinian woman was shot dead and Israeli forces moved onto high alert around Tel Aviv yesterday as a US Middle East envoy held talks with Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qorei in a bid to revive the stalled peace process.

Kamleh Al-Shuli, 20, was hit by two bullets in the chest when soldiers at a roadblock opened fire on a taxi taking her to Al-Najah University in the West Bank town of Nablus, medical and security sources said.

Shuli’s death brought to 3,643 the toll since the start of the Palestinian intifada in September 2000.

Israeli police meanwhile reinforced security in the Tel Aviv area and the coastal plain near the West Bank after a threat of an attack in the area, public radio reported yesterday. Police set up barricades in the region and closed a main eastwest road linking the West Bank to the coast.

Against the tense background, US Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Near East Affairs David Satterfield met yesterday with Qorei in the West Bank as part of a tour aimed at breathing fresh life into the moribund peace process.

The US envoy is to meet today with Dov Weisglass, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s chief of staff, as well as Avi Dichter, chief of Israel’s domestic intelligence service, Shin Beth, and Gen. Aharon Zeevi, chief of military intelligence.

Qorei said he told Satterfield that Sharon’s threats of unilateral actions were an “obstacle to peace” and also demanded a halt to the building of Israel’s controversial separation wall in the West Bank.

But Qorei also said no date had yet been fixed for a widely anticipated summit with Sharon.

“First we must ensure that there would be results from such a meeting,” he said, adding that senior Palestinian Cabinet officials and top Sharon aides would soon hold more preparatory talks.

In Cairo, Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Maher said the time was now right for a resumption of peace talks between the two sides.

“I think that there are favorable signs pointing toward a new opportunity that the Arabs and the Palestinians must be ready to seize,” he said.

Maher also vowed that Egypt, which last week hosted talks between Palestinian factions over a possible truce, would continue its contacts with Israel “to serve the Palestinian cause”.