Abbas security move aims to bolster statehood bid

By Adam Entous

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas will deploy hundreds of members of his security forces in the northern West Bank city of Jenin as early as Saturday, expanding a Western-backed campaign to bolster statehood talks.

Palestinian, Israeli and Western officials said the law-and-order campaign would include elements from Abbas's Presidential Guard, some of whom received training in Jordan under a U.S.-funded program, as well as members of Abbas's National Security Forces and the Palestinian civil police.

Up to 500 of Abbas's men will be deployed in all, they said.

Jenin, long a militant bastion and the site of a bloody battle with Israeli forces in 2002, will be a high-profile test of Abbas's ability to exert security control, an issue at the heart of U.S. efforts to secure a statehood deal this year.

Washington sees the Jenin deployment as a proving ground that could help the Palestinians make their case for statehood. Israel has said it will not implement any peace agreement until the Palestinians show they can rein in militants.

With soaring unemployment, Jenin's security campaign would be accompanied by a series of economic development projects, officials said. Washington wants to show progress on security and economic development in the occupied West Bank before U.S. President George W. Bush visits Israel later this month.

One Palestinian security source in Jenin said Abbas's forces would be authorized to enter Jenin's volatile refugee camp and other areas that have been off-limits to Palestinian forces.

An Israeli security official said Palestinian forces, totaling 470 men, would arrive in Jenin from Ramallah, Jericho and Hebron. "We are coordinating the deployment," he said.

In addition to moving the forces, Israeli sources said a new police station would be opened in the Jenin area on Saturday.

WILDCARD

U.S.-backed peace talks were launched in November with the goal of reaching a statehood deal before Bush leaves office in January, but Washington says neither side is doing enough to meet their obligations under a peace "road map."

Israel is meant to halt settlement activity and remove Jewish outposts, while the Palestinians combat militants.

Security has already improved in Jenin since militants from Abbas's Fatah faction began turning in weapons as part of a government-sponsored amnesty program coordinated with Israel.

Hundreds of Hamas members were jailed by Palestinian forces in Jenin after the Islamist group's takeover of the Gaza Strip last June, but most of them were freed after turning in weapons and pledging not to fight Abbas's government.

Most Fatah militants say they will go along with Abbas, but Islamic Jihad, hard hit by an Israeli crackdown, is a wildcard.