No takers yet, 13 Palestinians wait in Church

Buses arrived at the Church of the Nativity on Thursday morning to remove all but 13 of the Palestinians inside the site under an agreement ...

Buses arrived at the Church of the Nativity on Thursday morning to remove all but 13 of the Palestinians inside the site under an agreement to resolve the five-week siege in stages.

The 13 Palestinians will remain inside the church — surrounded by Israeli troops — until a country can be found that will accept them as exiles, according to sources.

Twenty-six other militants, who signed an agreement to renounce terrorism, will be transferred to the Gaza Strip under Palestinian control. About 80 other Palestinians will be briefly questioned, then released, Lt. Col. Olivier Rafowicz, a spokesman for the Israeli army said.

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The agreement came as the Israeli government approved new military operations against ‘‘terrorist targets’’ in response to the latest suicide bomb attack by a Palestinian in the city of Rishon Letzion, south of Tel Aviv, which killed at least 15 people and wounded 57 and Prime Minister Ariel Sharon faced new demands from his hard-line allies that he deal harshly with Yasser Arafat.

But the Israeli government statement gave no details of what operations had been approved. It only said the Security Cabinet had empowered Sharon and Defence Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer to take any action they deemed necessary.

In the Bethlehem agreement, Palestinian and church officials said the army would withdraw troops from most of the city of 140,000, which has been under a tight curfew for 38 days.

Canon Andrew White, the Anglican envoy to West Asia, said he expected the 13 would be exiled to Italy and Spain, and that talks were underway with both countries to smooth the way for that transfer. An official of Israel’s Foreign Ministry, Jonathan Peled, said on Thursday that both Spain and Italy had so far refused to take the exiles. White declined to say how long that exile would last but sources estimate the term could be for three years.

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Rafowicz said the 26 Palestinians have already signed a paper renouncing terrorism. They were to be followed by about 80 other Palestinian civilians who had fled to the church on April 2 to take refuge from an Israeli incursion. After that, about 10 foreign peace activists who had rushed into the church about a week ago were to be removed. He added the foreign activists would face action by Israeli civil authorities for having entered a closed military area.

White said the last 13 men inside, whom Israel calls ‘‘hard-core terrorists,’’ would be disarmed. They would be placed in one area of the Church of Nativity compound, under the supervision of representative of the European Union. White declined to specify the area, but Palestinian sources said it was a room in the Greek Orthodox monastery in the compound.

Although a resolution appeared at hand in Bethlehem, the Israeli stance toward Arafat appeared to be hardening again. Since the attack late on Tuesday, there had been expectation that Israel would unleash a military reprisal. Israeli television reported that the army was mobilising for a raid into Palestinian-ruled area in the Gaza. Israeli news reports also said the suicide bomber in Rishon Letzion, who has not been identified, came from Gaza.(LATWP)