ARABS-ISRAEL - Dec 28 - Egypt Sends Weapons To Abbas, Israelis Say.

After co-ordination with Israel and the US, Egypt has sent a shipment of weapons and ammunition into the Gaza Strip to forces loyal to the Palestinian Pres Mahmoud Abbas of Fatah. Senior Palestinian officials denied the report, including the spokesman for Abbas, Nabil Abu Rudeineh, who called the report "Israeli propaganda aimed at aggravating the situation between Fatah and Hamas". A senior US official said the point of the arms shipment was not to promote civil war between Fatah and the governing Hamas movement, but to help Abbas and Fatah and "to provide deterrence and balance" in the Gaza Strip, where Hamas is especially strong. Israeli officials confirmed a report in the newspaper Haaretz that PM Ehud Olmert approved the shipment in a meeting with Abbas and that four trucks with about 2,000 automatic rifles, 20,000 ammunition clips and two bullets passed from Egypt through the Israeli-controlled Kerem Shalom crossing into Gaza and were handed to Abbas's Presidential Guard at the Karni crossing. Benjamin Ben-Eliezer, an Israeli cabinet minister and a former defense minister, appeared to confirm the transfer to Israeli Army Radio, saying that the weapons were intended to give Abbas "the capability to hold his own against those organizations that are trying to spoil everything". That was an allusion to Hamas, which refuses to recognise Israel's right to exist and rejects previous Israeli-Palestinian agreements that call for a permanent two-state solution. US officials, though circumspect, said various efforts to bolster Abbas's forces were taking place, including training of the Presidential Guard and the likely return to the Palestinian territories of a thousand or so well-trained but aging Fatah fighters who live in Jordan: the Badr Brigade of the Palestine Liberation Organisation. The Bush administration is seeking congressional approval to spend up to $100, mostly for salaries and training, to help Abbas and his security forces and extend their control over the Gaza crossing points. Olmert also agreed at the meeting with Abbas to hand back $100 in withheld Palestinian funds and strongly suggested that a big prisoner exchange was coming. The moves by Olmert are part of a broader US and Israeli effort, in coordination with moderate Arab states like Egypt, Jordan and Saudi Arabia, to lift Abbas, weaken Hamas and show some movement on the stalled issue of Israeli-Palestinian peace. But officials involved consider their efforts something short of a plan, because Fatah remains weak, Abbas is considered unpredictable and too wedded to the Fatah old guard, and conditions are not ripe for a major effort at finding a comprehensive settlement. Still, the officials say, given the problems of the region - the US difficulties in Iraq; the growing influence of Iran; Israel's inability to defeat Hizbullah while wrecking much of Lebanon; and Hamas's sway over Gaza - some efforts are needed to alter the status quo and promote the cause of moderate Palestinian political goals. "The most important thing for us is to get a process going between Abbas and the Israelis", the senior US official said. "If the Palestinians end up with a consensus supporting Hamas, you push off any real peace process for a long, long time. If they opt for this kind of unity, fine, but then there is nothing we can do for them and there will be no Palestinian state, and it's not a good outcome". Abbas has called for early presidential and parliamentary elections, something Hamas opposes but the Americans support. The US would have liked Abbas to confront Hamas six months ago, the official said, but fears that if Abbas waits much longer, his position will be even weaker. "The longer that goes by, the harder it is for him", the official said. "We've been trying to explain to him that every option is risky now, but that the status quo also has its downside. Doing nothing and getting weaker does not help". The Israeli FM, Tzipi Livni, in an interview published in Haaretz's weekend magazine, talked gingerly about "a detailed operative plan" to negotiate with Abbas, a set of ideas she has discussed with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Abbas aides. "My vision says that the two nation-state principle is not only an Israeli gift to the Palestinians but advances Israeli interests", Livni said. But a FM official said that "there's a Livni vision but no Livni plan per se". Her thesis - largely shared by Olmert - is that Israel, the West and moderate Arab states want Abbas and Fatah, whatever their weaknesses, to win out over Hamas, the FM official said. "So they should have guns, and resources for patronage, and there should be a political vision and framework for moving forward, so that if Palestinians do choose the right path, there is something real and tangible for those who believe in a two-state solution", the official said. In essence, Livni is suggesting talks with Abbas that result in a Palestinian state in temporary borders - effectively the second stage of the moribund road map to peace - with Israel pulling back in the West Bank to the current route of the separation barrier. Abbas has repeatedly rejected the idea of a Palestinian state in temporary borders, seeing it as a trap, because there would be no guarantee that Israel would move further toward a final settlement. "But it's possible that now Palestinian moderates need some political ammunition to show people that negotiations will bear real and tangible results", the FM official said. "We need to strengthen the political horizon that Palestinian moderates can offer". With such results in hand and a period of visible reform in Fatah, the Israeli official said, new elections could result in Hamas's defeat.