Israel has intensified its efforts to get the international community to include Hamas, Islamic Jihad and the Hizbullah as targets in the global anti-terror campaign. The efforts come at a time when Palestinians refuse to arrest suspected Hamas and Islamic Jihad terrorist leaders, and when all three organizations have initiated violent attacks, effectively shattering chances that the recently negotiated Israeli-Palestinian cease-fire would last. Meanwhile, American officials continued to debate how to relate to the anti-Israel terror groups.

In a communiqué issued yesterday by the diplomatic-security cabinet after its late night session discussing the Alei Sinai terrorist infiltration, Israel called "on the U.S. and the international community to declare Hamas, Islamic Jihad and Hizbullah as terrorist organizations against which immediate action must be taken."

According to senior diplomatic officials, the exclusion of these organizations from U.S. President George W. Bush's list of targeted organizations, including those whose assets he froze by a recent executive order, only encourages Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat's inaction against them.

However, American officials question why Israel was raising the issue. "All three of those organizations have been on the list for some time," State Department spokesman Richard Boucher told a reporter yesterday. "I believe all three of those organizations have been subject to specific and particular financial controls for some time as well," he added.

An executive order issued by former President Bill Clinton in 1995 prohibited financial transactions in the United States with groups attempting to disrupt the Middle East peace process, including Hamas, Islamic Jihad and Hizbullah, but did not have the global reach of the one signed by Bush last week. In Israel's eyes, these terrorist organizations should be lumped together with Osama bin Laden's Al Qaida network as targets for the global anti-terror campaign.

Danny Ayalon, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's foreign policy adviser, said that these organizations - like bin Laden's - are driven by the same ideology and have a global reach. "We think it is important that they be on the new lists," Ayalon said, "in order to give fighting them high priority."

Under the terms of the cease-fire agreement signed by Foreign Affairs Minister Shimon Peres and Arafat on September 26, the Palestinians were to begin arresting some 104 suspected terrorists from a list Israel provided. Senior Israeli defense officials surmised that the Palestinians would not make the arrests.

Tawfik Tirawi, Palestinian head of Palestinian Intelligence in the West Bank told The Voice of Palestine this week, "There are no terrorists. We will arrest no one. Those who open fire on Israelis are not terrorists." Even so, Israeli leaders hoped the PA would still make sincere efforts to prevent the Hamas and Islamic Jihad from launching terrorist attacks.

Maariv reported today that the United States has pressured Arafat to arrest at least the "top ten wanted" terrorists from the list supplied by Israel. According to the report, if Arafat made the arrests, the U.S. would begin focusing its attention and pressure on Sharon and initiate their new Middle East peace policy.

Terrorist groups stage violent attacks in defiance of cease-fire
The Hamas and Islamic Jihad announced that they would not abide by the cease-fire negotiated last week by Arafat. In the past few days, each organization has staged violent attacks in order to show its resistance to efforts to ease the violence and bring Israel and the Palestinians back to the negotiations table.

One Israeli suffered minor injuries and two others were treated for shock when a car bomb exploded in Jerusalem's Baka neighborhood on Monday morning. The 12-kilogram bomb, packed with nails, screws, and M-16 and Kalashnikov bullets, exploded in a stolen car parked in a small parking lot on Bethlehem Road. The Islamic Jihad took responsibility for the attack, in a report broadcast an hour after the bombing on the Qatari-based Al Jazeera TV station.

The military wing of the Hamas claimed responsibility for the terrorist infiltration into the northern Gaza Strip settlement of Alei Sinai Tuesday night, in which two Israelis were killed and 16 civilians and soldiers were injured. Hamas leaders claimed that the cease-fire never began and therefore would not continue. They vowed that the Izzadin al-Qassam would continue its actions against Israel and the settlers.

Hizbullah launched a surprise mortar and missile attack on two IDF outposts on Mount Dov Wednesday afternoon. Stating that it was opening a "second front for the Intifada," the Hizbullah apparently was attempting to evoke a strong Israeli response that would torpedo U.S. efforts to form a global coalition against bin Laden. Israel responded to the attacks, in which no injuries were suffered, with a relatively low-key response of tank shelling and missiles fired from helicopters.

The timing of Hizbullah's attack caught Lebanese officials by surprise. "It's very surprising," said a Lebanese security source. "The timing is strange and very risky, particularly as Israel keeps telling everyone that Hizbullah is a terrorist group and it should be hit. Now Hizbullah is giving everyone a reason to hit them."

Debate in Bush administration with regard to Hamas, Hizbullah
According to a New York Times report, published today, there is intense internal debate in the Bush administration where Hamas and Hizbullah fit into the United States' global campaign against terrorism. The first priority, agreed by both the State Department and the Pentagon, is eradicating Osama bin Laden and his Al Qaida terror network. But how the administration relates to anti-Israel militant groups, and the states that sponsor them, is not exactly clear.

Though the United States has defined Hamas and Hizbullah as the main anti-Israel terrorist groups for over a decade, and branded Iran and Syria as state sponsors of terror due to their support for the groups, senior administration officials believe that focusing the spotlight on Hamas and Hizbullah now would blur the current mission against bin Laden and erode international, and in particular Arab, support for military strikes.

"This isn't a Hizbullah moment," one senior administration official told the Times. "It's an Osama bin Laden moment. It's very important to take this one step at a time."

President Bush's recent executive actions to freeze the assets of terrorist groups excluded Hamas and Hizbullah. That omission prompted former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich to write Sec. of State Colin Powell a letter calling for their inclusion. "To ignore them will be to weaken the moral basis of our efforts," he wrote. "It will signal to much of the world that the United States abandons its friends to appease some of its enemies."

The State Department reportedly determined that there was no clear evidence linking Hamas and Hizbullah to Al Qaida. Officials argued that maintaining the separation was crucial to building as wide an international coalition as possible.

But according to the New York Times report, sources in the Pentagon have uncovered strong, if inconclusive, evidence linking the Hizbullah to bin Laden's network. Still the Joint Chiefs of Staff have argued against diluting their military mission by targeting the anti-Israeli groups at this time.

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