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American Morning

Deadly Violence Continues to Plague Middle East

Aired March 15, 2002 - 07:02   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, Israel pulls out of four towns in the West Bank, but deadly violence continues to plague the region. The redeployment came as U.S. envoy General Anthony Zinni met with Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and after Secretary of State Colin Powell called Sharon to deliver a blunt demand that Israel pull out.

General Zinni is to meet with Yasser Arafat a little bit later today in Ramallah. And while Israeli tanks and troops are now positioned outside of the West Bank town, CNN's Ben Wedeman reports the scars of the occupation remain.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BEN WEDEMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Before the pullout, at the entrance of Ramallah's main refugee camp, a familiar face-off -- Palestinian children against an Israeli tank, an uneven, almost surreal confrontation. For three days, Al Amari refugee camp was under a round the clock curfew. Israeli forces rounded up and took away most of the men. Camp residents witnessed some of the most intense fighting since Israeli forces entered Ramallah earlier this week. They hardly welcomed the return of their old enemies.

"We've gone back 40 years,'' says Saeed Nimar (ph). Camp residents tell of Israeli soldiers going from house to house, ransacking room after room. They came three times to the home of Abu Amjed Tarifi (ph), turning everything upside down and inside out. "The soldiers,'' he says, "did more than just that.''

ABU AMJED TARIFI: No, no, he take it, take it, telephone, camera, (UNINTELLIGIBLE) and my bucket about 3,000 chickens. Believe me. And 170 dinar (ph), others. Everything, everything they are taking.

WEDEMAN: The Israeli Army denies its soldiers have engaged in theft. An Israeli Army spokesman says bomb workshops, weapons and a large quantity of ammunition were found in the camp. Israel claimed similar finds in many of the areas it entered during its recent offensive, but that offensive cost the Palestinians around 150 lives.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WEDEMAN: Paula, the battle of Ramallah is now over, but now it's up to the residents here to clean up the city after three and a half days of intense fighting. We were downtown today and saw crushed cars, shops smashed up, broken windows everywhere. Meanwhile, also the residents of Ramallah now have an opportunity to bury the dead. There was a very noise and well attended funeral today for the approximately 10 people who were killed in the fight -- Paula.

ZAHN: Ben, where do the people there think this Zinni mission is headed?

WEDEMAN: Well, they certainly are hoping that it's going to be headed to a cease-fire and eventually possibly a resumption of the peace process, which has essentially been more or less in the freezer for the last 17 1/2 months. But people we speak to here are telling us that they're skeptical about the Zinni mission. There's a fear here or a suspicion here that really what the United States is doing is just trying to calm down the situation between the Palestinians and the Israelis in order to pave the was for some sort of action against Iraq.

There is a feeling that the United States is focused on its war on terrorism and is not necessarily sincere about resolving the Arab- Israeli or the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

Now, Mr. Zinni will be meeting with the Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat in about four hour's time. This is a process that could take a good deal of time. He's going to be going back and forth between the Israelis, trying to come up with some sort of way to end the violence that has been plaguing this area for now almost 18 months -- Paula.

ZAHN: All right, Ben Wedeman, thanks so much for that live update.

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