Buckle your seatbelts. Gulf Daily News, Bahrain
10 February 2004
Palestinians set to declare state
RAMALLAH: Palestinian leaders are considering whether to unilaterally declare a state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip as a response to Israeli threats of go-alone partition measures, a senior official said yesterday.
The US has discouraged previous Palestinian threats to declare a state, saying that it supports Palestinian statehood only through negotiations with Israel. Most European countries have taken a similar stance.
Israel said the announcement would do nothing to help negotiations on a US-backed peace "road map".
The Palestinian official, Yasser Abed Rabbo, said that declaring a state was being considered as an option in reaction to Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's pledge to enact a unilateral "Disengagement Plan" if peace talks fail.
Sharon has made clear his strategy would leave Palestinians less land than they want for a state.
Abed Rabbo said the Palestinians could declare a state on land occupied by Israel in the 1967 Middle East war - the West Bank, Gaza Strip and Arab East Jerusalem - and then request international legal recognition of their authority.
Abed Rabbo said he had put forward the suggestion at a meeting of executive committee of the Palestine Liberation Organisation.