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Source: http://abcnews.go.com/wire/World/ap20030508_1684.html
Israel Ready to Resume Talks with Syria
(AP/ABC News) Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon told Israel TV Thursday that he was prepared to resume peace talks with Syria, as long as Syria did not set conditions. "We will bring our demands, and they will bring their demands, and we will discuss the issues," he said. "I am prepared to conduct negotiations with all Arab countries with no prior conditions," he said. "The two sides must sit across the table from each other." Syria has said it would only resume talks at the point where they last broke off three years ago. At that time, Israeli had proposed concessions on the Golan Heights. Sharon confirmed that he had received messages from Assad in recent weeks, offering to resume talks, but felt the offer was a Syrian ploy to ease U.S. pressure on Damascus and decided to wait "a few weeks." He noted that Syria is under intense U.S. pressure over charges that it harbored members of the deposed Iraqi regime and has large stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons, and Assad may have been using the offer as a way to placate the Americans. Sharon said he had met the new Palestinian prime minister, Mahmoud Abbas, "many times, including in this house," referring to Sharon's farm in southern Israel. He said Abbas was a Palestinian leader who had concluded that violence against Israel was fruitless and said he could be "a partner" for peace talks. Abbas has called violent Palestinian acts a mistake. Israel demands that all violence cease before negotiations resume, but Sharon has said that a meeting between himself and Abbas is being planned. Sharon said Israel would not cease attacks on militants until they had been reined in by the Palestinian Authority.