Oct 30, 2:19 PM EDT

*Palestinians Raise Stakes for Talks
*
By DALIA NAMMARI
Associated Press Writer

RAMALLAH, West Bank (AP) -- The chief Palestinian peace negotiator
raised the stakes Tuesday for a U.S.-sponsored peace conference, saying
there will be no talks with Israel unless it agrees to set a deadline
for establishing a Palestinian state.

Ahmed Qureia's ultimatum is the latest problem to beset already troubled
plans for the conference. Arab nations have been slow to endorse the
effort, and Israel is making only general promises instead of specific
proposals.

However, it was unclear if the Palestinians could afford to follow
through with their ultimatum, boycotting a conference called by
President Bush at a time when moderate President Mahmoud Abbas needs
Western support and U.S. aid in his struggle against Hamas, which
expelled his loyalists and took over Gaza in June. Instead, the threat
could be a ploy to wring concessions from Israel.

Israel and the Palestinians differ over the issue of a timetable for
setting up a Palestinian state, and talks between Abbas and Israeli
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert have so far failed to solve the impasse.

On Tuesday, lead Palestinian negotiator Ahmed Qureia tightened the screws.

"The Israeli prime minister has stated that he will not accept a
timetable, and we say we will not accept negotiations without a
timetable," Qureia said at a news conference with the European Union's
external affairs commissioner, Benita Ferrero-Waldner.

Qureia indicated the talks with Israel weren't going well.

"We haven't gotten closer yet concerning the issues," he said. "We are
talking in general about the issues that should be included in the
document. (But) we haven't yet touched the core issues."

What the Palestinians want, he said, is "a clear and specific document,
without vagueness,, that lays the basic foundation for all final status
issues. Without that, the conference will be hindered."

Israeli government spokeswoman Miri Eisin said negotiations should be
held behind closed doors, not through the media.

"We're not at the ultimatum stage," Eisin said. "They agreed to work to
go forward, and we are committed to going forward to a joint statement."

No date has so far been set for the peace conference in Annapolis,
Maryland, because the two sides remain so far apart on the starting
point. Israel wants a vague joint statement of objectives, but the
Palestinians want a detailed outline that would address core issues.

These include final borders, sovereignty over disputed Jerusalem and a
solution for Palestinians who fled or were expelled from their homes in
the war that followed Israel's creation in 1948.

In the past, deadlines for establishing a Palestinian state have been
set and ignored. The latest was the "road map" plan of 2003, a
three-stage process ending in creation of a Palestinian state in 2005.
The plan stalled at the first stage.

Qureia said a U.S. envoy, Lt. Gen. Keith Dayton, is meeting with both
sides to try to revive the "road map."

In Egypt on Tuesday, Abbas lashed out against Israel for cutting fuel
supplies to Gaza in an effort to pressure militants there to stop their
daily rocket fire into southern Israel. Ten mortar rounds exploded in an
Israeli village near Gaza Tuesday afternoon, the military said. No one
was hurt.

On Monday, Israel's attorney general held up the government's plan to
cut back electricity supplies to Gaza, demanding more work be done to
prevent humanitarian harm.

"We have told the Israelis that they are wrong in adopting these
measures, which we fully reject," Abbas said after meeting with Egyptian
President Hosni Mubarak in Cairo. "We do not accept at all this
collective punishment."

Palestinians in Gaza rely on Israel for all of their fuel and more than
half of their electricity.