Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
PLO leader Yasir Arafat (right) shakes hands with Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin as President Bill Clinton
watches, after the signing of the Oslo Accords, Washington, DC, September 1995. (Getty Images / Image
Bank.)
end by December 1998, would allow for confi dence-building measures. Israel believed that
having to govern territory and provide for the needs of the population would bring Arafat and
the PLO to moderate their stance.
The most important question was whether the PLO would use its new governing author-
ity, large international fi nancial donations, and security forces to stop terrorism and to build
a stable political and economic infrastructure. If the PLO and the Palestinians really yearned
for a state and wanted to end the long Israeli occupation, they would have a major incentive to
make the process work, or so the Israelis hoped.
Israel's assumptions about the PLO were built into the structure of the Oslo Accords and
the supplementary agreements made in 1994 and 1996. Israel and the PLO recognized each
other, and the accords established a Palestinian Authority (PA) to rule territory currently oc-
cupied by Israel, starting with the entire Gaza Strip (except for Israeli settlements there) and
the town of Jericho.
The West Bank was divided into three areas: Area A, all of the towns except for Hebron
(whose status would be determined in 1996), would be under full PA control. Area B, the vil-
lages, was to be governed by the PA politically, but Israel would have the right to enter them for
security purposes. Area C, Jewish settlements and unpopulated areas, continued to be under
Israeli control. All Jewish settlements, the PLO agreed, would remain where they were until a
full peace treaty was signed. Israel stated, without PLO disagreement, that it would not build
