Mitchell Inquiry will look for a way through the worsening crisis. (AP)

	Second submission of the Palestine Liberation Organization to the Sharm El Sheikh Fact-Finding Committee
	Second submission of the Government of Israel to the Sharm El Sheikh Fact-Finding Committee

Israel has submitted a 50-page document to the Sharm El-Sheikh Fact-Finding Commission led by former U.S. Senator George Mitchell, which arrived in Israel today on a working visit. The document is Israel's official response to a position paper submitted earlier to the commission by the Palestinians, detailing their version as to what started the current crisis.

In the Israeli document, evidence is presented showing that the Palestinian Authority is directly responsible for initiating and maintaining the six months of violence in the region that has left over 400 people dead.

To back this position, Israel's report includes a taped statement by Palestinian Telecommunications Minister Imad al-Falouji at a PLO rally in Lebanon on March 2, in which the Minister is heard saying that the Palestinian uprising was planned in response to the failed Camp David peace talks, rather than being a spontaneous response to Sharon's visit to the Temple Mount.

The tape, obtained by the Associated Press, is attached to the report and forms part of Israel's central message to the commission, that the "Palestinian Authority instigated, orchestrated and directed the violence against Israel," and is continuing in this path "until Israel accepts Palestinian demands."

The previously submitted Palestinian report blames Israel for a history of "institutionalized oppression against Palestinian people", and what it calls "Israel's lawless conduct in the occupied Palestinian territories throughout the past 33 years." The Palestinians argued that a "powder keg" had been created by Israel's actions, and that "all that remained was for a spark to set off a crisis."

The report states that the "spark" that set off the Palestinian uprising was then Likud opposition leader Ariel Sharon's September visit to the Temple Mount, a place holy to both Jews and Muslims, and a central point of friction between the two groups. The report said that Sharon's visit, accompanied by at least 2000 armed Israeli police, "infuriated Palestinians", and led to a spontaneous mass uprising which drew its strength from the streets.

This is the argument espoused by Palestinian and pro-Palestinian spokespeople in the world media since the beginning of the uprising, a position categorically denied in the Israeli submission to the Sharm El-Sheikh commission.

The submission of the Israeli document marks Israel's renewed cooperation with the commission. In January, members of the Mitchell team toured the Temple Mount without Israeli knowledge or consent, and Israel boycotted them afterwards. Prime Minister Sharon announced that he planned to cooperate with the commission.

Though the Israeli report attempts to demonstrate a degree of empathy with the suffering of the Palestinian population, it also rails against what it terms exaggerations, outright lies, the intentional use of inaccuracies, and the use of loaded words used by the Palestinians, saying that "Israel is concerned at the easy propensity towards inaccuracy, overstatement and omission by the Palestinian side in its submissions both to the Committee and to the world at large as a fundamental element in its campaign against Israel." For example, the characterization by the Palestinians of their confrontations with Israel over recent months as "demonstrations" and of the "demonstrators" as "unarmed" and "civilians" is a gross distortion of recent events.

The Israeli report also completely rejects the Palestinian charge that Israel has been following a policy of "assassination", citing a Red Cross guideline that says civilians who choose to participate in hostilities automatically become combatants, thus forfeiting the immunity they previously enjoyed as civilians. The report also debunks the PA's claim that Israel is causing it economic harm. "Palestinians have no "right" to work in Israel. The benefits of economic integration are the fruit of a peaceful interaction between Israelis and Palestinians. This cannot be expected to survive the kind of confrontation that the Palestinians have been waging on Israeli society over the past five months."

The five-man international commission will examine the two reports, and finish its round of meetings with local players this week in an attempt to fulfill its mandate of providing an independent and objective review of the current crisis with the goal of preventing its recurrence. The commission was established by international and regional leaders last October at a summit held in Sharm El-Sheikh.

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