"The draft put forward by the Americans does not at all meet (the Russian) criteria," Ivanov said in televised remarks. "The American draft, the resolution which was submitted yesterday for preliminary discussion among the five permanent members of the Security Council, does not, for the moment, meet the criteria which we set down before and stand by now," he added, noting Moscow was concerned to avoid a resolution that might automatically allow the use of force against Baghdad. "Active consultations will therefore continue on this issue both within the Security Council and outside it," Ivanov said.

The latest text of Washington’s draft resolution, to be presented to the UN Security Council, drops its two most troublesome points — explicit authorization to use force against Iraq and a proposal for inspectors from the five veto-wielding Council members to accompany UN arms inspectors. But it still provides some legal cover to attack Iraq with a warning of serious consequences if Baghdad obstructs inspections, citing its earlier breaches.

Ivanov said it was in Russia’s interests "that a mutually acceptable decision be found to this issue to safeguard unity within the Security Council, first and foremost among the five permanent members".

Speaking after talks with chief UN weapons inspector Hans Blix, Ivanov said he had discussed the resolution with US Secretary of State Colin Powell and French Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin. De Villepin said some progress was still needed to reach an overall balance acceptable to all.

Washington expressed impatience. "We will continue to work in the United Nations," White House spokesman Ari Fleischer told reporters on Air Force One as President George W. Bush traveled to Pennsylvania. "It is coming down to the end. The United Nations does not have forever, and we’ll continue to work it and see when we get an agreement, if we get an agreement, how to proceed."

US and British warplanes attacked Iraqi air defenses in a northern "no-fly" zone yesterday after Iraqi forces fired on patrolling jets, the US military said. In Baghdad, an air defense spokesman confirmed the raid but he said it targeted civilian installations.

The official Iraqi news agency INA said Saddam met senior military officers to discuss contingency plans. Military Industries Minister Abdul Tawab Mulla Howeish, the chief of Iraq’s anti-aircraft defenses, Gen. Mozahem Saab Al-Hassan, and other high-ranking defense officials attended the meeting.

  Evangelical Christians back eviction
By Barbara Ferguson, Arab News Correspondent

WASHINGTON, 23 October — Throughout the world, criticism is growing against Israel’s hard-line tactics against Palestinians, but support for Zionism remains firm among America’s millions of evangelical Christians.

Last week, thousands of evangelical Christians cheered as a member from Israel’s Knesset called for the "relocation of Palestinians" from the West Bank to Jordan.

Benny Elon, a member of the Moledet party, called for the "transfer of Palestinians" to Arab countries, saying the Bible calls for a "resettlement" of the Palestinians. His remarks were applauded at the annual convention of the Christian Coalition, and many of the neo-conservatives waved Israeli flags. The audience also cheered House Majority Whip Tom DeLay, who told them to back pro-Israel candidates.

"Most evangelicals are certain that God always takes the side of Israel" in any conflict, Randall Balmer and Lauren F. Winner say in "Protestantism in America" (Columbia University Press). National Review says evangelicals hold a "divine right" viewpoint and support Israel with an "uncritical fervor that exceed that of even some American Jews."

Such an example is Christian Coalition founder Pat Robertson, the main speaker at the Christian Coalition convention held in Washington. He attacked Yasser Arafat, saying he had "killed or deported the vast percentage of Christian population in Bethlehem."

Robertson also accused the Palestinian Authority of being "a group of Mafia-like thugs, who have been imported from Tunisia, and really, Palestine has been occupied by Yasser Arafat and his thugs. We cannot turn that nation over to them."

Robertson rejected any legitimacy of the Palestinians’ claim to their land, saying, "the Palestinians are really Arabs who moved there a few decades ago.

Their claim to that land really does not go back very far such as it is." He added that the Jewish claim goes back thousands of years.

If anyone questioned Robertson’s claim, they only needed to double check the facts with the Israeli Foreign Ministry, Tourism Ministry and Israeli Embassy booths set up at the convention. If anyone was feeling confused, Elon reassured them: "I know, we always have to be politically correct, but it is very, very complicated to be politically correct when you have to correct so many political mistakes."

Elon, an Orthodox rabbi, told the audience that to correct such mistakes meant they must turn to their Bible, "which says very clearly...we have to resettle them, to relocate them, and to have a Jewish state between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean."

Although the Sharon government did not send an official representative, it allowed Jerusalem Mayor Ehud Olmert, a senior member of the Likud party but not a member of the Cabinet, to represent it.

Olmert further stirred up the audience when he said he came "from the city of God, the place which God made the capital of the Jewish people more than 3,000 years ago." He promised them that an undivided Jerusalem would remain the capital of Israel.

Experts commenting on the conference say fundamentalist Christian, pro-Israel beliefs are fueled less by evangelical graduate-level theologians than by media-savvy television preachers, such as Robertson. In addition, pro-Israel rallies are also held each year during the US Gospel broadcasters’ convention.

"Literalist" evangelicals often obfuscate historical facts in the Middle East. One example is Richard Land, a social-issues spokesman for the southern Baptist Convention, who told the Los Angeles Times earlier this year that the welfare of the United States depends on friendship with Israel because of God’s biblical covenant with Abraham’s descendants. It appears he overlooked Ismail’s lineage, also Abraham’s son.

OCCUPIED JERUSALEM, 23 October — US Middle East envoy William Burns yesterday called a Palestinian attack in northern Israel that killed 14 people a blow to the goal of a Palestinian state as Israel held off retaliation.

"Yesterday’s terrorist attack against a civilian bus in northern Israel claimed by a Palestinian group with offices here in Damascus was a reprehensible act," Burns told reporters in Damascus after talks with Syrian President Bashar Assad. "It does severe damage to Palestinian interests and aspirations, it cannot be tolerated by anyone who genuinely is interested in peace," he said.

For the first time in months the Israeli military did not respond quickly to a major Palestinian attack. Prime Minister Ariel Sharon is under growing pressure to prevent an escalation in fighting as the United States courts Arab countries in preparation for a possible US strike against Iraq.

Israeli Interior Minister Eli Yishai confirmed that US interests were being considered. "There are those (in Israel) who say that we need to react now and immediately with all power and all force," Yishai told Israel Army Radio. "On the other hand, we could cause difficulties for the Americans. If the Americans attack Iraq, it’s in our interest as well as that of the Americans."

Israeli security sources said any response to the attack would be limited to avoid damaging US preparations for a possible war on Iraq. They said the army was preparing a series of operations against Palestinian groups, including Islamic Jihad, which said two of its members carried out Monday’s bombing.

Burns, on a regional tour to provide a "roadmap" back to a peace process stalled for two years, called on both sides to exercise restraint in order to help advance toward a Palestinian state and broader regional stability.

"If we are to succeed in ending occupation, building two states and resuming progress toward comprehensive peace, it is critically important to stop the violence that has done so much to undermine legitimate Palestinian aspirations," he said. "There has been far too much suffering and bloodshed on both sides, and both sides have an obligation to make it stop."

Palestinian officials said Yasser Arafat has decided on a new Palestinian Cabinet and will present it to Parliament next week for approval. But they said Arafat had kept all but three or four ministers in their posts, and he could face a showdown with the reform-minded assembly to get the new line-up approved.

"It will be a tough battle of wills between Arafat and lawmakers next week," one official said.

Arafat’s previous 21-member Cabinet quit last month after sensing it would lose a confidence vote in Parliament. That Cabinet came under withering criticism for perceived incompetence during a two-year-old uprising for independence in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, and some ministers had come under attack for alleged corruption.

The United States has made creating a Palestinian state conditional on reforms to Palestinian Authority institutions, especially the security services, and a change in leadership.

Ahmed Qorei, speaker of the Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC), said Arafat had put off announcing the Cabinet to ensure Israel lets all 88 lawmakers to reach Ramallah for Parliament’s session from elsewhere in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Palestinians are saddled with severe travel restrictions because of an Israeli military clampdown on Palestinian-ruled areas imposed since the uprising began.

Rumsfeld declined to give details, but told reporters the United States had determined they were no longer of intelligence value and were not candidates for criminal prosecution.

Another senior defense official told Reuters the prisoners to be removed from the base included Pakistanis. It was not clear whether they would be simply released or turned over to their home governments for possible further action.

"Detainees" from 43 countries began arriving at the base under heavily armed guard from Afghanistan and other areas in January and are being held at a prison camp constructed for them after Sept. 11 attacks on America.

One Afghan prisoner was repatriated in April after doctors determined he was mentally ill. But the only other Guantanamo prisoner moved from the camp to date was Yaser Esam Hamdi. He was sent to a Navy prison in Norfolk, Virginia, after authorities learned he was born in Louisiana to Saudi parents and could be considered a US citizen. He is being held there indefinitely as an "enemy combatant."

Pakistan said last month that the majority of its 58 citizens detained at Guantanamo were not linked with the Al-Qaeda network and their release was being discussed with Washington. A six-member team of Pakistani investigators visited Guantanamo in August to interview the prisoners.

Speaking at a Pentagon briefing on the war on terrorism, Rumsfeld said "there are a few that have now been moved through that process" of deciding they no longer need to be held by the United States. "I’ve said ‘That’s fine with me.’"

"It’s true that that process is working and that there are some people likely to come out the other end of the chute," the secretary added.

No charges have been filed against any of the nearly 600 prisoners being held in a military prison camp at Guantanamo Naval Base although the Bush administration has left open the possibility that some could face military tribunals.

Conrad Johnson, a 35-year-old father of two, was shot as he stood at the top of the steps of the bus shortly before 6 a.m., Montgomery County police said. The location, 24 km (15 miles) north of downtown Washington, is less than a half-mile from where the rampage began Oct. 2. In all, 13 people have been shot by the sniper in Maryland, Virginia and Washington — three were critically wounded.

"We remain concerned about the safety of all the people in our region," police chief Charles Moose said. "We realize that the person or the people involved in this have shown a clear willingness and ability to kill people of all ages, all races, all genders, all professions, different times, different days and different locations," he said.

Police put a widespread dragnet into place, clogging traffic on Connecticut Avenue, one of the main arteries into Washington, just as the morning commute began.

The shooting happened near an apartment building and wooded area along Connecticut Avenue. The bus was parked at a staging area where drivers get ready for their morning runs, state police spokesman Cpl. Rob Moroney said.

Agents for the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms combed the area. A police dog searched near a basketball court in a park, and police helicopters flew over the scene.

On Saturday night, the sniper critically wounded a 37-year-old man outside a steakhouse in Virginia, investigators said. On Monday, police said they received a call about the attack, hinting it was from the sniper, but that the call was muddled.

"The person you called could not hear everything you said. The audio was unclear and we want to get it right. Call us back so that we can clearly understand," said Moose, who has been leading the hunt.

Moose did not disclose who received the muddled phone call, when it was made or other details. But investigators believe the call may have come from the sniper and that the caller was the person who left a note and phone number at the scene of Saturday night’s shooting, a law enforcement source said on condition of anonymity.

On Sunday, Moose publicly pleaded with the note writer to call authorities.

Media reports said the note threatened schoolchildren with violence, demanded money and sought to establish communication with police. The sealed letter of several pages set in motion a series of messages from police delivered through the news media, the Sun newspaper said, citing police sources.

The Los Angeles Times, citing unidentified federal agents, said the note was poorly worded, bordering on broken English.

The victim shot Saturday night was felled by a single shot to the stomach. He remained in critical but stable condition at a Richmond hospital yesterday after doctors removed his spleen and parts of his pancreas and stomach. Surgeons retrieved the bullet and ballistics tests linked the slug to the sniper.

With some districts now closing schools and many other public activities curtailed by the 20-day-old shooting spree, authorities are struggling to contain public alarm over the sniper. Moose said the population should be under "heightened alert".

Experts have highlighted how the killer has made the public feel vulnerable by randomly picking off targets as they carry out their daily business. "They are the most fear-provoking events," said Jack McDevitt, a professor of criminology at Northeastern University in Boston, Massachusetts.

"Most people hear of a shooting and say to themselves: ‘This could never happen to me,’" McDevitt said. But the random nature of the shootings is designed to frighten the approximately five million people who live in and around Washington. "There is nothing you can do to make yourself less vulnerable," he said.