June 1993, Page 101

Facts For Your Files: A Chronology Of U.S.-Middle East Relations

Compiled By Janet McMahon

March 1: As the U.S. began an airdrop of relief supplies to besieged towns in eastern Bosnia, U.N.-sponsored peace talks among Bosnian Muslims, Croats and Serbs resumed in New York.

March 2: Two Israeli cabinet members, Health Minister Haim Ramon and Interior Minister Aryeh Deri, urged Israel to consider withdrawing from the occupied Gaza Strip.

The U.S. State Department acknowledged that American diplomats had held secret talks in Amman, Jordan with Hamas representatives over a period of months, but that contacts had ceased in late February.

March 3: U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees Sadako Ogata said that, even if only 10 percent of the information she was receiving was accurate, "we are witnessing a massacre" of Muslims by Bosnian Serb forces. U.N. Secretary-General Boutros Boutros Ghali proposed a plan for transferring peacekeeping operations in Somalia to U.N. forces by May 1, leaving only 8,000 American troops in the country after that date.

March 4: Mohammed A. Salameh, a 25-year-old Jordanian citizen, was arrested in Jersey City, New Jersey in conjunction with the Feb. 26 bombing of New York's World Trade Center.

March 6: The Egyptian government indicted 49 suspected Muslim militants on charges of attacking foreign tourists.

March 7: U.N. Secretary-General Boutros Ghali said that if diplomatic efforts fail to result in Serbian withdrawal from Bosnian Muslim and Croatian territory, the U.N. "must be ready to send troops on the ground. "

Israeli authorities announced they had arrested a fourth American citizen, Chicago-area resident Anwar Harridan, on suspicion of having links with Harnas.

March 8: White House spokesman George Stephanopoulos said the U.S. is "not going to get involved" in an offensive military operation in the former Yugoslavia.

Egypt's militant Islamic Group denied that it or exiled Egyptian cleric Sheikh Omar Abdul Rahman was involved in the World Trade Center bombing.

March 10: The Palestinian delegation to Mideast peace talks rejected the U.S. invitation to resume talks in Washington April 20, saying, "We do not think conditions are right yet for issuing invitations."

FBI agents arrested a second suspect, Kuwaiti-born chemical engineer Nidal Ayyad, in conjunction with the World Trade Center bombing.

In Cairo and Aswan, Egypt, police raids left more than 40 people wounded and 26 dead.

March 12: A series of 14 bomb explosions rocked the city of Bombay, India, killing more than 200 people and wounding hundreds more.

March 14: Bosnian Muslim leaders voted to demand that the Vance-Owen peace plan provide for a stronger centralized government over the proposed 10 semi-autonomous provinces. Israeli Police Commissioner Yaacov Terner urged Israelis with gun permits to carry their weapons to avert attacks by Palestinians.

March 15: In a meeting at the White House, President Clinton assured Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin of continued U.S. support, and told reporters afterward that the two "did not discuss" the repatriation of some 400 Palestinians expelled to southern Lebanon.

Leaders of Somalia's warring factions met in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, for U.N.-sponsored national reconciliation talks.

March 16: Israeli troops killed two teenagers and wounded more than 70 other Palestinians in clashes in Gaia's KhanYounis refugee camp. In the Golan Heights, where on the previous day an intoxicated Israeli settler shot a Druze Arab he claimed he had mistaken for a "terrorist, " thousands of Druze demonstrated, calling for the return of the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights to Syria.

The director of the Rome office of Iran's exiled National Council of Resistance was assassinated by two gunmen on a motorbike while being driven to work.

March 17: A huge explosion in central Calcutta destroyed two apartment buildings, killing at least 60 people.

Somali peace talks being held in Addis Ababa broke down following the ouster of forces allied to Mohamed Farah Aideed by loyalists of Mohamed Said Hersi Morgan in the Somali city of Kismaayo.

March 18: In a show of force designed to prevent further fighting, 500 U.S. troops patrolled the streets of Kismaayo.

Kurdish guerrilla leader Abdullah Ocalan proposed a cease-fire with Turkish groups to last through the Nowruz holiday until April 15.

March 19: In response to a request from the U.N. High Commissioner for Reftigees, the U.S. agreed to nearly double the amount of relief supplies being air-dropped to Bosnia. After being delayed by Serb forces for over a week, a U.N. relief convoy reached the besieged town of Srebrenica.

March 22: The U.N. Security Council postponed a vote on enforcing its "no-fly" zone over Bosnia because of Russian concerns over the domestic impact of such a policy.

An East Jerusalem Palestinian stabbed and wounded five students and their teacher in a Jewish schoolyard, setting off a rampage by bands of local Israelis.

March 23: An arrested Palestinian, bound hand and foot and under police guard, was killed by a Jewish settler with an Uzi submachine gun.

March 24: Mahmoud Abouhalima, wanted in connection with the World Trade Center bombing in New York, was turned over to U.S. officials by Egyptian authorities in Cairo.

The Israeli Parliament elected former Defense Minister Ezer Weizman, a supporter of the Camp David Accords and of direct negotiations with the PLO, as the country's seventh president.

March 25: The Bosnian government and Croatian negotiators accepted the United Nations peace formula calling for the creation of 10 semi-autonomous provinces and a weak central government in the former Yugoslav republic. Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic refused to sign the agreement.

Former Israeli Deputy Defense Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was elected leader of the Likud Party in a nationwide primary.

A fifth suspect, Bilal Alkaisi of Newark, NJ, was arrested and charged with "aiding and abetting " the bombing of the World Trade Center.

March 26: The U.N. Security Council voted to establish a 30,000-strong peacekeeping operation in Somalia.

March 27: Somali leaders meeting in Addis Ababa agreed to establish an interim government leading to elections in two years.

March 29: As the U.N. Security Council renewed its ban on Iraqi oil exports, the Clinton administration indicated it no longer considered the removal of Saddam Hussain a prerequisite for the lifting of sanctions against Iraq.

March 30: Israel closed the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip for an indefinite period of time and relaxed the rules under which its soldiers may fire at armed Palestinians.

Two Serbs accused of war crimes were sentenced to death by a Bosnian military court.

March 31: The U.N. Security Council voted to authorize NATO warplanes to shoot down any aircraft violating the "no-fly" zone in Bosnia.

A sixth suspect, 25-year-old Ramzi Ahmed Yousef, whose whereabouts were unknown, was charged in connection with New York's World Trade Center bombing.

April 1: East Jerusalem Palestinian leader Faisal Al-Husseini accused Israel of creating "a massive collective prison" by indefinitely closing the West Bank and Gaza Strip and called the action an obstacle to resuming peace talks. E Four alleged members of the Abu Nidal organization were indicted on charges of conspiring to commit terrorist acts in the U.S.

Federal District Judge Kevin Duffy set a Sept. 14 trial date for the suspects in the World Trade Center bombing, and placed a strict gag order on prosecuting and defense attorneys and on law enforcement officials.

Israeli gunboats and helicopters attacked two Palestinian bases in northern Lebanon. Hours later in Beirut, the top security official of the PLO's Fatah organization was assassinated by unidentified gunmen.

The Pakistan government announced a crackdown on violent Islamist groups.

April 2: The self-styled Bosnian Serb parliament rejected the Vance-Owen peace plan, signed by the Bosnian government and Croatian representatives.

April 4: A Bosnian military commander refused to allow the evacuation of 2,000 Muslims from the besieged town of Srebrenica, on the grounds that it would empty the town and leave it open to surrounding Serb forces.

The Israeli cabinet appointed a special committee to recommend ways of replacing 20,000 Palestinian workers with unemployed Israelis. L1 Armenian troops captured the western Azerbaijan town of Kalbajar, opening up a second corridor to the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh.

April 6: Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak met at the White House with U.S. President Bill Clinton, who rejected Mubarak's suggestion that he pressure Israel to speed up the return of some 400 expelled Palestinians.

April 7: The Justice Department announced it would drop fraud and conspiracy charges against former Secretary of Defense Clark Clifford and his law partner, Robert Altman, in connection with the Bank of Credit and Commerce International scandal, while reserving the right to bring broader charges at a later date. Altman, currently on trial in New York on state charges, and Clifford are accused of having deliberately misled federal investigators about BCCI's ownership and control of First American Bankshares, Inc., of which they were president and chairman respectively.

The U.N. Security Council approved U.N. membership for "the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia," ending an 18-month delay over objections by Greece that the name Macedonia applied only to its northern state.

April 8: San Francisco police raided Anti-Defamation League offices in San Francisco and Los Angeles, seizing files on more than 950 organizations and 12,000 individuals.

The World Court, while declining to exempt Bosnia from an international arms embargo, ordered Yugoslavia "to take all measures within its power to prevent ... the crime of genocide. " El As NATO announced it would begin enforcing the " no-fly " zone over Bosnia on April 12, Germany's Constitutional Court approved the participation of German troops in the mission.

April 9: Israel accepted East Jerusalem resident Faisal Al-Husseini as a member of the Palestinian negotiating team at the Mideast peace talks.

U.S. fighter jets bombed Iraqi antiaircraft installations from which Iraqi gunners allegedly had fired upon the U.S. planes in northern Iraq's "no-fly" zone.

The U.N. Security Council renewed but did not strengthen year-old sanctions against Libya for its failure to surrender two intelligence agents accused of the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103.

U.S. officials said Iran was on the verge of buying a new intermediate-range missile from North Korea.

April 11: The Israeli cabinet voted to extend the closure of the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip on a week-to-week basis.

Russian President Boris Yeltsin asked the U.N. Security Council to delay its vote on tightening sanctions against Serbia until after an April 25 national referendum on Yeltsin's reform program.

Armenian forces captured 18 villages and strategic mountain positions near the southern Azerbaijan town of Fizuli.

NATO planes preparing to enforce the U.N.'s "no-fly" zone over Bosnia were ordered not to fire on aircraft violating the ban except as a last resort.

April 12: As NATO planes flew over Bosnia to enforce the "no-fly" zone, Serbian forces renewed attacks on Sarajevo and the besieged town of Srebrenica, killing 50 civilians and breaking a two-week-old cease-fire.

April 13: Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak met with PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat in Cairo to discuss the PLO's position on resuming Mideast peace talks.

Hezbollah guerrillas ambushed an Israeli patrol in southern Lebanon, killing three Israeli soldiers. In retaliation, Israel attacked six Lebanese villages.

April 14: U.S. Special Envoy Reginald Bartholomew warned that the U.S. would support lifting the arms embargo on Bosnia if Bosnian Serbs did not agree to the Vance-Owen peace plan. In London, former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher accused European Community members of acting "a little like accomplices to massacre."

Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin met with Egyptian President Mubarak, who conveyed the PLO's conditions for resuming Mideast peace talks.

A class action suit filed in San Francisco Superior Court charged the Anti-Defamation League with violating privacy rights through files it kept on thousands of individuals and organizations.

Former President George Bush was given a hero's welcome on a private visit to Kuwait, his first since the Gulf war.

April 16: The Palestinian delegation to Mideast peace talks said it would recommend that negotiations, scheduled to resume April 20, be postponed until "all the obstacles," including the return of expelled Palestinians and the recent closure of the occupied territories, were removed.

April 17: As the Bosnian and Serb commanding generals signed a cease-fire agreement to "deniflitarize" the besieged town of Srebrenica, Russian diplomats at the U.N. indicated they would not support increased economic sanctions on Serbia.

Turkish President Turgut Ozal died in Ankara of heart disease.

April 18: Pakistani President Ghulam Ishaq Khan dismissed the government of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and dissolved parliament.

Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak dismissed Interior Minister Mohammed AbdulHalim Musa, naming the governor of Upper Egypt's Assiut Province, Hassan Mohammed Alfi, as his successor.

A U.S. fighterjet reportedly destroyed an Iraqi radar-tracking site south of the "no-fly" zone after being targeted while on routine patrol.

April 19: Fighting between Bosnian Muslims and Croats intensified around the central Bosnian towns of Zenica and Vitez.

April 20: Following a meeting between PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat and Syrian President Hafez Al-Assad in Latakia, Syria, Arab foreign ministers met in Damascus to discuss resuming Mideast peace talks.

April 21: Arab foreign ministers announced that they and the Palestinian delegation had unanimously agreed to resume Mideast peace talks on April 27.

April 22: An Egyptian military court sentenced 7 Islamists to death and 25 others to prison terms on charges of attacking tourists.

April 23: Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin said he was prepared to offer Palestinians greater autonomy, including their own police force, in addition to allowing the return of at least 35 Palestinians expelled between 1967 and 1987.

April 24: Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic rejected a last-minute compromise peace offer from EC negotiator Lord David Owen.

April 27: After a four-month break, Middle East peace talks resumed in Washington.

In nationwide elections, Eritreans voted overwhelmingly for independence from Ethiopia.

Yemen held its first multiparty election, three years after the merger of Marxist South and capitalist North Yemen.

As stricter U.N. sanctions against Serbia took effect and Russian President Boris Yeltsin warned that Russia would not support continued rejection of an international peace agreement, Bosnian Serbs launched a major new offensive near Bihac.

April 28: Yugoslav President Dobrica Cosic said his country would not take any "radical measures" to pressure Bosnian Serbs to accept the U.N.-backed peace plan.

U.S. forces in Somalia turned over their last regional command to the United Nations.

The Israeli government asked the country's Supreme Court to preserve the security police's right to use "moderate physical pressure" when questioning Palestinian prisoners.

April 29: Israel agreed to allow 5,000 Palestinian expatriates with relatives in the occupied territories to remain after their traditional summer visits.

April 30: Fifteen expelled Palestinians, including the president of Bir Zeit University and a former mayor of Al Birah, returned to their homes on the West Bank amid welcoming celebrations.

The State Department's annual report on " Patterns of Global Terrorism" found that the 361 incidents of international terrorism in 1992 represented a 36 percent decline from 1991 and was the lowest in 17 years.

The U.N. announced that Bosnian peace talks will resume in Athens on May 1.