Palestinians Hail Israel’s Move to Let 30 Exiles Go Home

Jubilant Palestinian peace negotiators claimed their first significant victory after 18 months of talks Wednesday when Israel agreed to permit 30 Arab activists, most of them now old men who were deported about two decades ago, to return to their homes in Israeli-occupied territory.

“This is the beginning of the unraveling of the whole (Israeli) policy of deportation,” said Hanan Ashrawi, spokeswoman for the Palestinian delegation. “This includes people whose return, after a long exile, will make a difference to the country.”

They are expected to join the leadership of the Palestine Liberation Organization forces on the West Bank and strengthen it substantially in the competition with Hamas, the militant Islamic organization competing with the PLO for popular support.

At the same time, Ashrawi said that Israel refused the request of at least 15 longtime deportees for repatriation. And the dispute over about 400 Palestinians who were expelled in December to a no-man’s-land in southern Lebanon continues to fester.

Israeli negotiators turned over the list of exiles who will be allowed to return as the latest round of peace talks began. Israel left it to the Palestinians to announce the action, probably to give the concession maximum impact in the occupied territories.

Despite the gesture, however, the sides were still far apart in the separate but overlapping negotiations between Israel and each of its Arab adversaries, Syria, Jordan, Lebanon and the Palestinians.

Ashrawi said that the entire peace process may collapse unless there are results soon.

“I don’t want to be the voice of doom or gloom . . . (but) certainly, if this round fails, it is not just that the peace process is dead but you are unleashing forces that are the opposite of the peace process.”

The 30 exiles include senior political figures in the Palestine National Council, the Palestinians’ parliament in exile, and the PLO.

“These were people from the era of popular struggle, mass struggle--men and women of the left, members of the old Communist Party and other progressive movements,” said Ghassan Khatib, a member of the Marxist Palestine People’s Party and a former member of the peace talks delegation. “The older men will obviously not have the relevance they had 20 years ago, but they command respect and thus will have influence.”

No decisions have been made yet on details of returning the deportees. Some West Bank leaders favor a mass return in triumph. But other West Bank sources suggested that part of the deal with Israel may be to require the exiles to return in small groups.

Kempster reported from Washington and Parks from Jerusalem.