Rabin Says Israel Will ‘assist’ PLO in Setting Up Its Agencies in Jericho

Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin declared Tuesday that Israel would “assist” the Palestinians in setting up their self-governing agencies in Jericho if they are unable to move them there from Jerusalem.

The prime minister made the pledge, first to the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee and then at an impromptu news conference, following a statement by Palestinian leader Faisal Husseini on Monday accusing Israel of waging a campaign to remove all Palestinian self-rule institutions in Jerusalem.

Rabin said he distinguished sharply between those institutions in Jerusalem whose task was to deal with the various needs of the Palestinian population in Jerusalem and other institutions that would in effect serve as constituent agencies of the Palestinian governing authority in the Gaza Strip and Jericho.

Rabin said the Palestinians were committed under the self-rule accord to set up this second category of agencies in Jericho.

If they did not fulfil their commitment, Rabin said, Israel would assist them in doing so.

Rabin noted that the Israeli authorities were studying the functions and purposes of the various Palestinian institutions in Jerusalem.

He said the authorities would use “legal means” to enforce the terms of the agreement.

The Palestine Liberation Organization’s Jerusalem headquarters, located at Orient House in the eastern section of the city, has long been a matter of controversy between the government and opposition in Israel, and indeed between hawks and doves within the governing coalition.

Israeli opponents argue that the steady growth of the institutions located at Orient House and in nearby facilities is deliberately intended by the PLO to lay the groundwork for a future Palestinian seat of self-government — and later for a full-fledged capital.

LIKUD CITES VOTING CONCESSIONS

The Likud particularly faults the government for allowing, in the accord signed last September, Jerusalem-based Palestinians to have the right to vote in the elections for Palestinian self-government, which are scheduled to take place in several months.

The question of where they are to exercise that right was left open, with the Israeli side insisting that it be exercised outside the Jerusalem city limits.

Nevertheless, the Likud and other parties of the right argue that the concession on voting opened the way to further Israeli concessions on the final status of Jerusalem.

The concession on voting rights, members of the right contend, recognizes that the Jerusalem-its Palestinians are part and parcel of the newly created autonomy.

But government officials point to the fact that people in the West Bank with Jordanian citizenship have the right to vote in Jordanian elections — but that does not make the West Bank part of Jordan.

Israel and the PLO agreed last September that the issue of Jerusalem was to be negotiated only in the “permanent status” talks, due to begin within two years.

Since then, however, and especially in recent days, the two sides have been accusing each other of seeking to change the status quo in the city to its own advantage.

The Israelis are criticized for building new housing projects — “settlements” in Palestinian parlance — and for cutting off Jerusalem from the West Bank by means of the closures intermittently imposed on the territories.

And the Palestinians are accused by Israel of attempting to build up Orient House and its allied institutions into a capital-in-embryo.

Highly placed Palestinian sources in the city have claimed midweek, meanwhile, that a secret agreement exists between Israel and the PLO ensuring the inviolability of the existing Palestinian institutions in Jerusalem.

Rabin was questioned specifically on this Tuesday. But observers noted that his statement, though tough-sounding, did not directly contradict the Palestinian claim, which, it could be argued, related to institutions devoted to the needs of Jerusalem-based Palestinians.