Just as the Americans at the last minute substituted a useless and castrated resolution of their own at the United Nations Security Council earlier this month; they have now successfully twisted the Arab Summit not to discuss taking serious actions but to waste their time over more warmed over and harmless word discussions. Abdullah is now being used by the Americans as their front-man, just as in the past they used Anwar Sadat and then King Hussein before him. As we've indicated before, neither Fahd nor Abdullah are really King of Saudi Arabia when it comes to international affairs; rather their lont-time Ambassador in Washngton, Bandar, with his very close ties to the CIA and the Israelis, is really the functioning King.

JERUSALEM, March 19 (Reuters) - Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said on Tuesday Israel would give Palestinian President Yasser Arafat permission to leave the Palestinian territories and travel abroad if he implemented a U.S truce plan.

Standing alongside visiting U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney at a news conference, Sharon said this meant Arafat could be allowed to attend an Arab summit in Beirut later this month if he carried out the truce agreement known as the Tenet plan.

"I told the vice president that the implementation of the Tenet agreement will enable Mr Arafat to go outside the borders of the (Palestinian) territories and this has been decided by the cabinet," Sharon said.

If the Tenet plan, drawn up by CIA Director George Tenet, is implemented, Arafat "may be able to go to Beirut. It's all a matter of days," Sharon said. He added that the Israeli government would have to decide whether to allow Arafat return if his behaviour at the summit amounted to "incitement."

Arafat has said he hoped to attend the Arab summit, at which Saudi Arabia is due to present a Middle East land-for-peace proposal. The Palestinian leader has been bottled up in the West Bank city of Ramallah for more than three months by a punitive Israeli army blockade.

JERUSALEM, March 19 (Reuters) - Israel has created 34 new Jewish settlements in 12 months under Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, jeopardising Israeli security and obstructing U.S. peace efforts, the Israeli Peace Now Movement said on Tuesday.

Israeli lawmaker Didi Remez told Reuters an aerial survey conducted by Peace Now in recent weeks revealed that 34 new settlements had been set up on occupied West Bank land, in violation of stated public policy, since Sharon's election in February 2001.

"Most of the new settlement sites are at least 700 metres (yards) or more from established settlements, and some are at least 2,000 metres away," Remez said.

The international community generally considers settlements illegal. Washington has frequently urged Israel to stop building them, calling such action destructive to the peace process.

Israel denies creating new settlements, saying it is merely expanding existing ones, but Remez said this was "far from the truth, in fact there's a very clear change on the ground."

A statement from the Defence Ministry, which must approve settlement building, said the defence minister's instructions to the army and the civil administration were to prevent "any illegal activity in the field."

"Checks show that they (Peace Now) do not refer to new settlement points or outposts," the ministry said.

But Remez said: "They are new settlements because they have an independent infrastructure and control new terrain."

A Peace Now statement said the survey did not count military or quasi-military sites, or temporary memorial sites established in the same period.

The group said that there were already 145 established Jewish settlements in the West Bank and Gaza, on land the Palestinians intend to declare as an independent state.

Migration to those settlements had dropped significantly since the start of the Palestinian uprising against Israeli occupation in the West Bank and Gaza Strip in September 2000.

In the past 18 months, Palestinian militants have targeted settlers and soldiers in the occupied territories, while settlers have attacked and killed Palestinians.

Remez said current U.S. efforts led by Anthony Zinni to end the violence and revive peace talks in line with the U.S.-led Mitchell report would be hindered by creation of new settlements which daily change the geopolitical map in the occupied lands.

Statistics of the Yesha settler council put the population of settlers in lands Israel occupied in the 1967 war, excluding Arab East Jerusalem, at 227,000.

The Mitchell report calls for a total freeze on settlement building as a key confidence-building measure.

"The creation of the 34 new settlements shows that either the government is giving the settlers a free rein or it doesn't have control over what the settlers do," Remez said.

"In both cases, it has to take control and clamp down on settlers otherwise it cannot begin implementation of the Mitchell report and the settlement freeze," he added.

Peace Now said establishment of new settlements contradicted the Sharon government's own policy and violated a coalition agreement with the centre-left Labour Party.

"The detrimental impact of the settlements on Israel's future is clear for all to see. The creation of new settlements jeopardises Israel's security and places our soldiers in greater and unnecessary danger," said Peace Now's Ariel Arnon.

For the past 35 years, he said, settlers had "been leading Israel along a road of political and security suicide."

BEIRUT, March 19 (Reuters) - Beirut, painstakingly rebuilt after the destruction caused by Lebanon's 1975-1990 civil war, has long had the air of being all dressed up with nowhere to go.

That has all changed as the government frantically prepares for an Arab summit on March 27-28, which it hopes will relaunch Beirut as a vital centre of the Middle East.

Kings, heads of states, some 2,175 delegates and over 1,600 journalists will descend on the capital, witnessing its first Arab summit. The Saudi delegation alone is of 300 members.

Over 8,000 security men will look after the royals and VIPs.

"We have basically doubled our projections for the number of delegates attending. There is lot of interest in the world. Everybody is talking about this summit even before it convenes," Culture Minister Ghassan Salemeh told Reuters in an interview.

Beyond the logistics, a lot is at stake.

Worldwide interest in the annual regular Arab meeting soared after Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah announced a peace initiative to end the Arab-Israeli conflict, and said Arabs would launch it at the summit.

His unexpected move came against a backdrop of the raging Palestinian Intifada against Israeli occupation and threats of a U.S. military campaign to topple Iraqi President Saddam Hussein.

"We hope that Beirut will be an occasion to defuse some of the tensions in the Middle East. This is certainly one of the important criteria by which the summit will be judged," said the minister, entrusted with the task of planning the logistics.

The occasion has given Beirut a new buzz. Bumpy, pot-holed roads have been asphalted, a long-awaited bridge along the airport highway has been completed, neglected pavement walls painted and a VIP lounge readied.

Schools and main roads in Beirut will be closed during the summit to ease traffic and allow the heavy security patrols accompaning the delegates to move freely.

Normal air traffic at Beirut airport will be suspended on the arrival and departure days at certain times.

The minister has to organise landing facilities for the largest showing of private Arab jets this country has ever seen and accommodation for 430 crew members. Work is under way to reopen a military airport in northern Lebanon as a parking lot for the royal jets.

Beirut in its heyday used to be both the commercial and banking centre and the playground of the Arab world. Far more liberal than other Arab cities, its culture and sophistication made it a magnet for tourists from all over the Middle East and beyond.

The war changed all that, and although now as safe or safer than many Western cities scarred by crime, it is still struggling to overcome its linering reputation as a shooting gallery for rival sectarian militias.

"This summit means a lot to Beirut. It means that this country will be viewed as a secure and prosperous country, as a country able to organise an event of this size," Salameh said.

"Those who did not live abroad don't know how negative the image of Lebanon was: a terrorist, unstable country and a country of assassination," he added.

But there is always a lingering fear it might not happen. A summit of Francophone countries which was due to take place in Lebanon last September was cancelled after the September 11 attacks on the United States.

"The Francophone summit is still in our mind. There are always things happening in this region, so we always have fear it won't happen but we are proceeding as normal," Salameh said.

One benefit Lebanon could reap from the gathering would be to regain its place as a tourist destination for rich Gulf Arabs, who abandoned Beirut for Europe and the United States during the devastating civil war, Salameh said.

"This is a big test for us to prove that we have turned the page of war," Salameh said, noting that many of Beirut's Arab guests will be first-time visitors.

"Imagine if a security setback or incident occurs, what will be the image of Lebanon? This is why these are extremely high stakes for us. For the first time (since the war) the attention of the world will be focused on us."