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American Morning

U.S. Envoy Meets With Arafat

Aired April 05, 2002 - 09:03   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: Up front this morning, though, U.S. envoy Anthony Zinni met today with Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat in the West Bank town of Ramallah. The two discussed ways to reopen the process. But outside Arafat's compound where the meeting was being held there was conflict even before it began.

CNN's Michael Holmes was there. He joins us now from Ramallah.

Good morning -- Michael.

MICHAEL HOLMES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hi, again, Paula.

Yes, I'll update you on that a little later. First of all, some news out of that meeting with Gen. Zinni. Our contacts in the Palestinian Authority, including some inside the compound, tell us the meeting when on a bit over an hour. Gen. Zinni asking the Palestinians to set up a committee with which he could meet. Our understanding is that's going to be a three-person committee. It will include, among others, Saeb Erekat, the chief Palestinian negotiator. It doesn't include Yasser Arafat himself.

Yasser Arafat, at the meeting, apparently making it clear to Gen. Zinni that he feels that the Palestinian authority is ready to implement the Tenet plan as soon as possible in full. He has said that before and then move on to the Mitchell plan. He also made it clear to Gen. Zinni, we're told, that he feels that Israel is not abiding by any of the guidelines if you like, laid down by George W. Bush yesterday, guidelines that included an immediate withdrawal from Palestinian-controlled areas or supposedly Palestinian-controlled areas.

I can tell you that there has been a lot of fighting in and around the West Bank city of Nablus today, in the old city, a fierce gunfight underway. We have heard reports of seven Palestinians killed. They have been identified according to Palestinian sources. They tell us that perhaps as many as 15 are dead so far. The fighting continues there.

A curious incident in Hebron, the Israeli military has said that their operation in Hebron, which of course is a divided city, has been one that, in their words, is a pinpoint operation. They're looking for very specific targets.

One of those targets is Teob Sweki (ph). He is a member of Islamic Jihad and the Israelis were told by various Israeli military sources and Israeli media yesterday's Israeli troops went to house where they thought Sweki (ph) was. They engaged in gun battle there. An Israeli soldier was killed. Sweki (ph) either got away or wasn't there.

Now the follow on from that is today a helicopter fired a missile at a car, according to our Palestinian sources. It's not known whether they thought Sweki was in the car. The care, in fact, was empty. There were however seven bystanders wounded, three adults and four children including six-year-old in critical condition. So that's the latest around the West Bank, Paula?

ZAHN: Michael, describe to us what happened to you earlier today.

HOLMES: Well we, of course, as members of the media wanted to cover the arrival of Gen. Zinni to what is after all a crucial meeting, to try to get some sort of process back on track. As we do sometimes, we went in a convoy, five media vehicles, armored vehicles. We all got out. We were there for five minutes, nothing happened and then two Israeli jeeps came at us -- I got to say, at fairly high speed. They actually hit our vehicle, one of them, without warning from where I was standing and where most of my colleagues are standing. The first thing we knew was when a stun grenade went off. There was six or seven of them. As we then retreated, a rubber bullet was fired at our windshield and as we then got out of the area as quickly as we could and we're obviously leaving the area, we had two rubber-coated steel bullets fired into the back of our vehicle -- Paula.

ZAHN: So obviously the Israelis don't want you there. I mean are they going to eventually impose a perimeter area that you know you can't cross?

HOLMES: It's very difficult to know, Paula. You know one thing that I can tell you is the Israeli military knows where we are and we're not the only show in town. But there are several other crews. An American crew pulled out today, however. They apparently a little fearful for their safety. They pulled out just after this incident.

It's hard to know what they want us to do because they've not communicated directly with us here in Ramallah. We spoke to officers after this incident occurred. And they told -- they said this immediate area where were then was a closed military area, we had to go. If they wanted us out of Ramallah, they could have done it then -- Paula.

ZAHN: All right, Michael Holmes please stay safe. Thank you for that report.

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