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CNN Sunday Morning

Sharon Arrives to Volatile Situation

Aired February 10, 2002 - 11:03   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.
FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: More now on today's bloodshed in the Middle East. For that, we go to Jerusalem and CNN's Jerrold Kessel.

JERROLD KESSEL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Fredricka, just about an hour ago, Israel's Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon landed back in Ben Gurion Airport outside Tel Aviv, returning from the United States. Of course, he held those talks at the end of last week with President Bush at the White House, and Mr. Sharon coming back again to an increasingly volatile situation and to a Sunday situation to which Israelis are getting all to used.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KESSEL (voice over): The surprise for Israelis, not so much another attack, but the location, the relatively remote desert of Beersheba. It was the lunchtime break, the Israelis killed and wounded as two Palestinian gunmen began shooting with automatic rifles from their car, around a small cafe right across the street from a major army base.

Within a minute, the gunmen were dead themselves, shot by an Army Major who was passing by. Pandemonium, even hysteria, "we're not used to such shootings here" said one shopkeeper, prompting the question of whether this first such attack in the southern Israeli town was because would-be Palestinian attackers are being thwarted by tight security elsewhere, or because militant groups are expanding the scope of their operations.

Late Saturday on the West Bank, a 79-year-old Israeli woman was killed in a shooting ambush, as she was driving back to her settlement home with her son. He was injured.

Not far away on the fringes of the major Palestinian town of Nablis (ph), the gun battle erupted before dawn Sunday between gunmen and Israeli forces. The Israeli Army said soldiers made the incursion to conduct house-to-house searches for militants. Two of six Palestinians reported hurt in the exchanges are said to be in critical condition.

All the incidents came as Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon was returning home from his talks at the White House with President Bush. Palestinians say they've seen a hint of a shift away from what they called increasingly pro-Israeli bias in Washington's position, and aligned they say by U.S. acceptance of Israeli blockades like this, here outside the West Bank town of Ramallah, which forces people to walk long distances on foot.

KESSEL (on camera): President Bush said he told Prime Minister Sharon of the need to alleviate the plight of ordinary Palestinians, but it's what the President had to say about what symbolizes their plight most that angers Palestinians.

KESSEL (voice over): The trench and new reality over the hill in Ramallah is that Israeli tanks continue to keep Yasser Arafat pinned down in his West Bank Headquarters, as they've done for the past two months.

Mr. Sharon did win backing from President Bush that pressure on the Palestinian leader would be intensified, to compel him to crack down further on terror, but the Israeli leader seemed to fall short of winning support, at least in public, for his call for concerted action to replace Yasser Arafat as the Palestinian leader.

Unperturbed, the beleaguered Mr. Arafat in his headquarters continues to receive, as he does day after day, delegation after delegation of supporters.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

Deadly battles continue, and as those deadly battles continue, the focus will switch to the diplomatic battle, that ongoing battle over the future of Yasser Arafat. How much pressure can be brought to bear on him? What effect will that pressure have on the Palestinian leader, as he remains beleaguered in his headquarters in the West Bank? Fredricka.

WHITFIELD: All right, thanks very much Jerrold from Jerusalem. So far, no public reaction from President Bush to the latest round of violence in the Middle East.

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