Albright, U.S. Envoy to Meet With Arafat

The Clinton administration Sunday backed away from a threat to suspend its Mideast mediation and hastily arranged a meeting in London between Secretary of State Madeleine Albright and Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat.

The senior American mediator, Dennis B. Ross, flew to London to join the talks after meeting here with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

It was not immediately clear whether the Israeli leader, after a week of prodding by the Clinton administration, had finally softened his resistance to a pullback from 13% of West Bank land.

But an Israeli official told Associated Press that “some ideas came up” in a meeting late Sunday between Netanyahu and Ross and “they need to be discussed” with Arafat.

Netanyahu, meanwhile, flew home.

Albright, in London conferring with President Clinton, had agreed weeks ago with Arafat that 13 % was the amount of territory Israel should yield at this stage to the Palestinian Authority.

Meanwhile, Israeli troops firing rubber-coated metal bullets slightly wounded six Palestinians in the divided West Bank city of Hebron on Sunday during a fourth consecutive day of clashes with stone-throwers, witnesses said.

Clashes spread to Hebron and elsewhere in the West Bank after Israeli soldiers killed at least five Palestinians on Thursday in the most violent clashes in two years.