Arabs to discuss Gaza at Kuwait summit

KUWAIT CITY-Arab leaders agreed Tuesday to discuss Israel's war on Gaza at a Kuwaiti economic summit next week, shunning a Qatari proposal to hold an earlier emergency meeting in Doha.Qatar, the only Gulf Arab state with ties to Israel, renewed a call for an extraordinary Arab summit to be held on Friday in the third such plea as the Israeli offensive went into its 18th day.But Egypt and Saudi Arabia rejected the proposal, and Kuwait said Arab leaders would instead tackle the situation in Gaza at the planned meeting in Kuwait City.Arab countries have been wrangling over convening a summit on Gaza, largely hindering any joint action and underscoring a deep rift among them.Governments in the Arab world are divided between supporters of the Islamist group Hamas, which took control of Gaza in June 2007, and supporters of the Palestinian Authority's Mahmoud Abbas, who is in charge of the West Bank."It is only logical and natural that Gaza will be at the heart of the Kuwait summit. The (Arab) leaders will discuss during their summit the situation there," Kuwait's Sheikh Mohammad al-Sabah told the official KUNA news agency.He said Kuwait's Emir Sheikh Sabah al-Ahmad al-Sabah will discuss with his Arab counterparts means to "put a quick end to the sufferings of our brothers in Gaza".Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and Saudi King Abdullah said after meeting that they backed the Kuwait talks to seek a halt to the "aggression" in Gaza, in a statement carried by the official Saudi Press Agency.Arab leaders are due to hold their first-ever economic summit in Kuwait on January 19 and January 20 to discuss ways to boost economic integration among Arab nations.Pan-Arab channel Al-Jazeera reported Abbas had been scheduled to attend the meeting called for by Qatar.Meanwhile, Kuwaiti deputies, mostly Islamists, said the Palestinian leader whose mandate ended on January 9 was "not welcome" in Kuwait, criticising his response to Israel's Gaza offensive.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20090113/wl_mideast_afp/mideastconflictgazaarabsummitkuwait_20090113191728

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