Palestinians set accord to end Gaza raids in bid to save truce with Israel

GAZA CITY -- Palestinian leaders have reached an agreement with militants to halt mortar fire at Jewish settlements in the Gaza Strip, in an effort to rescue a three-month truce with Israeli forces, a Palestinian Authority official said yesterday.

The agreement was intended to curtail violence that had threatened to end the shaky truce and to overshadow President Mahmoud Abbas's meeting with President Bush on Thursday in Washington.

A Palestinian official said that ''factions including Hamas have agreed to stop rocket attacks," after the Palestinian interior minister, Nasser Youssef, had asked them to do so in talks that started on Friday in the Gaza Strip.

The talks were aimed at helping to preserve the cease-fire, which was called by Israeli and Palestinian leaders in Egypt in February.

Palestinian militants fired rounds of mortar bombs and rockets at settlements in Gaza, wounding one Israeli, after Israeli forces killed a man under disputed circumstances on Wednesday.

Israel has since killed two more Gazans whom they described as gunmen, including one who opened fire on the Kfar Darom settlement on Friday. The Israelis had threatened retaliation to quiet the region before a Gaza pullout, which is planned for mid-August.

''While we condemn the Israeli attacks on our territories, we believe no one should provide the Israelis with a pretext to continue and escalate these attacks," the Palestinian Authority official said of Youssef's agreement with the militants.

Youssef also ordered Palestinian security forces to fan out in the Khan Younis area of southern Gazato prevent further violence, the official said.

Sami Abu Zuhri, a Hamas spokesman, said that the group was committed to the cease-fire, but added that ''resistance operations will come in reaction" to Israeli violence.

Hamas had said it was avenging the death of fighters in Gaza last week.

Despite the eased tensions in Gaza, another diplomatic dispute erupted yesterday between Israelis and Palestinians over efforts to arrange a new summit meeting between Abbas and the Israeli prime minister, Ariel Sharon.

Abbas told reporters in Egypt after a meeting with President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt: ''I will meet Ariel Sharon on June 7," for the first time since both met on Feb. 8 in Egypt to declare an end to the bloodshed that began in earnest 4 1/2 years ago.

Spokesmen for Sharon denied that any meeting had been set, angering Palestinian officials who had voiced hope that talks could further boost peace efforts.

''The prime minister's bureau is interested in setting up such a meeting but no such meeting has been set for that date or any other date," said David Baker, an official in Sharon's office.

''Sharon's office called to request a summit . . . if Sharon's office wants another date, they should call us back," said a senior Palestinian official who was traveling with Abbas.

Palestinians want to resume delayed peace talks over a US-backed plan that calls for Palestinian statehood in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

Israel says peace talks can resume only after Abbas dismantles militant groups.