Premier Menachem Begin submitted today a blueprint for the proposed Palestinian autonomy plan to the 11man Ministerial Committee on Autonomy. Sources said the Premier’s plan was very similar to his original autonomy proposals drafted in December, 1977 and presented then to President Carter and President Anwar Sadat. That 26-point plan provided for an administrative council to be elected by the residents of the areas.
The sources noted recent public statements by Begin in which he asserted that autonomy would not mean legislative powers, that security would remain under Israeli control, that Jewish settlement rights would be retained throughout “Eretz Israel,” that “no border will again transverse Eretz Israel,” and that the plan would provide self-rule for the Arabs and security for the Jews.
Begin is understood to have studied other proposals drafted by Foreign Minister Moshe Dayan, Agriculture Minister Ariel Sharon, Interior Minister Yosef Burg and Transport Minister Haim Landau before formulating his own ideas. The Premier expects the ministerial committee and then the full Cabinet to debate his proposals and introduce whatever changes are thought necessary, where-upon it will be published.
News reports of the plan emanating from Israel have already elicited sharply negative reactions from Egypt. A Foreign Ministry spokesman in Cairo said today that the Israeli position was a “precondition” which could jeopardize the negotiations.
On the West Bank, meanwhile, tension continued to be high following a shooting incident yesterday in which a student at the Arab Bir Zeit college was shot in the chest. A right-wing intellectual, Prof. Ezra Zohar of Tel Hashomer Hospital, who was marching through the area at the time with other Gush Emunim activists, is being questioned by the pounce in connection with this incident.
Security personnel conducted a search at Bir Zeit College today and the institute’s director was asked later to meet with Military Government officials. In Bethlehem, the local university was ordered closed for four days after police broke up a rowdy demonstration by students in which stones flew and tires were set alight. There were no injuries.
Similar incidents were reported elsewhere on the West Bank today. Observers linked the unrest to the preparations for the autonomy talks with Egypt and also to Egypt’s increasingly uncomfortable situation within the Arab world.
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