Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, January/February 1999, pages 120-123

Facts For Your Files

October, November 1998 Chronology of U.S.-Middle East Relations

Compiled by Janet McMahon

Oct. 1, 1998: Israel's El Al airlines confirmed a Dutch newspaper's report that a Tel Aviv-bound cargo plane that crashed into an Amsterdam apartment block in 1992 carried the chemical DMMP, a key component of the deadly nerve gas Sarin.

* Chief U.N. weapons inspector Richard Butler confirmed that his team had exchanged data with Israeli intelligence.

* The U.N. Security Council condemned reports of renewed atrocities in Kosovo, while U.S. National Security Adviser Samuel "Sandy" Berger warned that the U.S. and other NATO aircraft could attack Serbian targets in Kosovo in a matter of days.

* Palestinian security forces arrested Hamas activist Hisham Sharabati and confiscated some 1,750 pounds of explosives from his home next to police headquarters on the outskirts of Hebron.

Oct. 2: Iraq's Deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz met in New York with U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan to discuss Iraq's decision not to resume cooperation with U.N weapons inspectors.

* Serb attacks in Kosovo were reported to have diminished following the latest U.N. and U.S. warnings.

* As Turkish troops amassed along the Syrian border, Damascus accused Istanbul of plotting with Israel to undermine Syria.

* Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi said he would not turn over the two suspects in the Pan Am Flight 103 bombing for trial in the Netherlands lest the U.S. kidnap them.

* Cyprus decided again to postpone the deployment of Russian-made missiles, which Turkey has threatened to destroy.

Oct. 4: President Suleyman Demirel warned Turkey would not tolerate Syria's alleged sheltering of Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) leader Abdullah Ocalan.

* The U.S. held its first joint military exercise with Algeria, a one-day search-and-rescue mission off the western resort town of Sidi Fredj.

Oct. 5: U.S. envoy Richard Holbrooke met with Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic to demand that he take further measures in pulling Serbian troops from Kosovo and ensuring the safe return of ethnic Albanian refugees. Milosevic accused the American diplomat of "support for Albanian terrorists" and called the threat of a NATO attack "a criminal act."

* Pakistan's chief army officer, Gen. Jehangir Karamat, called for a direct role in politics by the country's military.

* Saying no foreign power had ever subdued Afghanistan, Taliban leader Mullah Mohammad Omar warned Iran not to interfere in Afghan affairs.

Oct. 6: By a vote of 360 to 38, the House passed the Iraq Liberation Act of 1998, authorizing $99 million toward efforts to overthrow Iraqi President Saddam Hussain.

* An UNSCOM report said that while Iraq may be close to having eliminated its chemical and ballistic arms, Baghdad had not achieved compliance with its biological weapons program.

* Russia vowed to veto any U.N. Security Council resolution authorizing air attacks on Serbia's Kosovo province.

* As Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak shuttled between Ankara and Damascus, Turkey issued a "last warning" to Syria about harboring Kurdish rebels.

* In Jerusalem, Secretary of State Madeleine Albright warned that the time for negotiating peace was running out.

* The Taliban militia offered to stop growing poppies, from which opium is derived, in exchange for U.N. recognition as the legitimate government of Afghanistan.

Oct. 7: Following a meeting with Palestinian President Arafat and Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu, who became the first prime minister to cross to the Palestinian side of the Erez checkpoint, Secretary of State Albright announced a formal summit to be held near Washington, DC beginning Oct. 15.

* Gen. Jehangir Karamat resigned amid controversy generated by his call for a military role in Pakistan's politics.

* A federal grand jury in New York indicted Saudi dissident Osama bin Laden for terrorist attacks on Americans, including the Aug. 7 bombings of the embassies in Kenya and Tanzania.

* Yugoslav authorities barred the U.N. war crimes tribunal from investigating alleged atrocities in Kosovo.

Oct. 8: As Israeli soldiers in Hebron killed a Palestinian demonstrator, wounded 15 others and shot a news photographer in the back of the head, the Palestinian Authority warned Hamas leaders not to attack Israeli targets and jeopardize upcoming peace talks.

* Iran claimed to have beaten back a Taliban attack, inflicting "heavy casualties," in three hours of border skirmishes.

* As U.S. envoy Richard Holbrooke held his "grimmest ever" meeting with Serbian President Milosevic, foreign relief workers and diplomats were withdrawing from Kosovo in anticipation of a possible NATO attack.

* Along with Mohammed Saddiq Odeh and Mohammed Rashed Daoud al Owhali, U.S. citizen Wadih el Hage, allegedly a former secretary to Osama bin Laden, pleaded not guilty to 239 counts of conspiring to kill Americans in the bombing of U.S. embassies in Africa and other attacks.

Oct. 9: Less than a week before scheduled peace talks in the U.S., Prime Minister Netanyahu named hard-liner Gen. Ariel Sharon as Israel's new foreign minister.

* An Israeli soldier was stabbed to death outside the Jewish settlement of Tomer in the Israeli-controlled Jordan Valley.

* The Senate unanimously passed a compromise version of the International Religious Freedom Act giving the president greater discretion in imposing sanctions on countries which violate the religious freedom of their citizens.

* Pakistan's lower house of parliament passed a bill making the Qur'an the supreme law of the land.

Oct. 11: As NATO positioned itself to launch airstrikes, U.S. diplomats held a sixth day of negotiations with Serbian President Milosevic.

Oct. 12: India announced plans for "routine" military exercises on its border with Pakistan.

* Azerbaijan President Haidar Aliyev claimed to have won a second five-year term in Oct. 4 presidential elections boycotted by leading opposition groups and described by international observers as exhibiting "blatant violations of the law."

* Ayatollah Hassan Saneii, the head of Iran's conservative Khordad Foundation, announced he was adding $300,000 to the $2.5 million reward for the death of Satanic Verses author Salman Rushdie.

Oct. 13: As President Clinton announced that President Milosevic had agreed to comply with key international demands that he end his crackdown on Kosovo's ethnic Albanian majority, NATO voted to authorize airstrikes against Yugoslavia if Serbian security forces were not withdrawn from Kosovo within 96 hours.

* As the Israeli cabinet authorized him to negotiate a land-for-peace agreement with the Palestinians at an upcoming U.S. conference, Prime Minister Netanyahu threatened not to sign such a pact after an Orthodox Jew was shot and killed and his companion critically wounded near a communal farm west of Jerusalem.

* Turkish Defense Minister Ismet Sezgin said he believed Kurdish separatist leader Abdullah Ocalan had left Syria, lessening tensions between Ankara and Damascus.

* Following its regular review on sanctions on Iraq, the U.N. Security Council called on Baghdad to resume cooperation with U.N. weapons inspectors.

Oct. 14: Yugoslav President Milosevic shut down two Belgrade opposition newspapers.

* Afghanistan's ruling Taliban militia authorized the release of its last group of Iranian prisoners captured during the August offensive on Mazar-e Sharif.

* Following an amnesty order from King Hassan, Morocco freed 28 political prisoners, with an additional 20 remaining in jail.

Oct. 15: President Clinton met briefly at the White House with Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu and Palestinian President Arafat before flying to Wye Mills, Maryland for a new round of Mideast peace talks. Meanwhile, in Arab East Jerusalem, Jewish yeshiva students and right-wing Moledet Party members occupied a vacant Palestinian house.

* As NATO officials and Yugoslav President Milosevic signed an agreement on Kosovo, Western military leaders said they had evidence that Serbia had not withdrawn all its troops and special forces from Kosovo and warned that NATO was "ready and willing to act" if they were not withdrawn immediately. Later, NATO extended the withdrawal deadline to Oct. 27.

Oct. 16: Palestinian President Arafat and Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu held their first one-on-one meeting in more than a year.

* Lebanon's parliament officially elected Gen. Emile Lahoud to succeed President Elias Hrawi.

Oct. 17: At the behest of the Clinton administration, Saudi intelligence chief Prince Turki bin Faisal met with Taliban Supreme Council leader Mullah Mohammed Omar and requested that Afghanistan extradite Saudi dissident Osama bin Laden.

Oct. 18: Following reports of slow progress, President Clinton rejoined the Mideast peace negotiations being held in nearby Maryland and, after some 20 hours of personal involvement, extended them for an additional day.

* Serbian troops attacked several ethnic Albanian villages in Kosovo in retaliation for the deaths of three Serbian policemen the previous night.

* After three days of talks on ways to reduce the risk of a nuclear conflict, the foreign secretaries of India and Pakistan agreed only to meet again in February.

* Syria and Turkey held a low-level meeting as a first bilateral attempt at ending recent tensions between the two countries.

Oct. 19: President Clinton cancelled a West Coast fund-raising trip in order to remain with the Israeli-Palestinian talks, which continued for a fifth day at Wye.

Oct. 20: King Hussein of Jordan joined the Mideast peace talks at Wye.

* NATO's supreme commander Gen. Wesley Clark met with Yugoslav President Milosevic, warning him to remove more troops from Kosovo in compliance with his recent agreement.

Oct. 21: Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu backed off a threat to leave the Wye peace talks, which continued into the night. In Hebron, Palestinian authorities began a round-up of militant Hamas members.

* Under a U.S. law limiting foreign aid to countries which abuse human rights, the U.S. for the first time asked Israel to investigate its killing of Palestinians, specifically the March West Bank shootings of three Palestinians at an army checkpoint and of Reuters TV cameraman Nael Shyoukhi.

* Saying he saw no "viable" Iraqi opposition, Marine Corps Gen. Anthony Zinni, chief of the U.S. Central Command in the Persian Gulf, criticized the recent congressional decision to assist attempts at overthrowing President Saddam Hussain.

Oct. 22: After a week of talks involving President Clinton and administration officials including CIA Director George Tenet, Israeli and Palestinian negotiators were reportedly near an agreement.

Oct. 23: Despite Israel's last-minute demand that the U.S. release spy Jonathan Pollard, Prime Minister Netanyahu and Palestinian President Arafat signed an agreement for an Israeli withdrawal from an additional 13 percent of the West Bank--1 percent to be transferred to full Palestinian control, 9 percent to joint Israeli-Palestinian control, and 3 percent to be allocated to a "green zone" unavailable to Palestinians for development. Other provisions included the opening of the Gaza airport, safe passage between the West Bank and Gaza Strip, and enhanced Palestinian security efforts.

* With most moderate candidates having been dropped from the ballot in advance, conservatives won a majority of seats in elections for Iran's Assembly of Experts.

Oct. 24: The U.N. Security Council formally endorsed the Kosovo peace agreement, mandating NATO military intervention if necessary to protect some 2,000 unarmed international monitors.

Oct. 25: As Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu arrived home from Washington, right-wing Jewish settlers calling for his downfall lined his route from the airport to protest his signing of the Wye agreement.

* Following a third visit by NATO military leaders and 18 hours of meetings, Yugoslav President Milosevic agreed to withdraw enough Serb troops from Kosovo to meet NATO demands by an Oct. 27 deadline.

Oct. 26: Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu survived a no-confidence vote in the Knesset, although legislators threatened to introduce a bill calling for early elections, while hundreds of right-wing Israelis demonstrated in front of Netanyahu's home calling for his resignation and chanting,"Bibi is a traitor."

* Hundreds of Palestinian youths marched in Ramallah to protest the killing of a teen-age demonstrator by Palestinian police, whom the marchers denounced as CIA agents.

Oct. 27: Prime Minister Netanyahu postponed cabinet ratification of the Wye agreement, demanding that Palestinians first present a plan for combatting terrorism.

* Concluding that Yugoslav President Milosevic was in "substantial compliance" with its demands that he withdraw troops from Kosovo, NATO suspended its imminent attack but extended indefinitely its threat of airstrikes to ensure Belgrade's continued compliance.

Oct. 29: Palestinian authorities placed Hamas leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin under house arrest following an attempted suicide attack in Gaza on a school bus convoy carrying Israeli settler children which killed the bomber and an Israeli soldier and wounded eight others, including three Bedouin children living nearby.

Oct. 30: As the Palestinian cabinet ratified the Wye agreement, security forces were reported to have arrested more than 100 Hamas activists in the past 24 hours.

* In a letter to Secretary-General Kofi Annan, the U.N. Security Council outlined new guidelines for a comprehensive review of Iraqi compliance with sanctions imposed following the Gulf war, separating weapons inspections from "all other obligations" and, bowing to U.S. pressure, omitting a promise to lift sanctions once Baghdad has been cleared of possessing weapons of mass destruction.

* The U.S. began trial Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty broadcasts into Iraq and Iran.

Oct. 31: Iraq announced it was ending all cooperation with U.N. weapons inspectors.

* The U.S. and Israel signed a strategic cooperation agreement to protect the Jewish state against ballistic missile attacks.

* Iran began military exercises along its border with Afghanistan.

Nov. 1: As Iraq told the U.N. it would not comply with weapons inspections unless the Security Council moved to lift trade sanctions, the U.S. said it would consider missile strikes on Iraq if Baghdad refused to allow inspections.

* As Palestinian President Yasser Arafat agreed to a request by Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to delay the implementation of the Wye agreement for several days, Jewish settlers erected a barbed-wire fence around an area where they plan to build a new settlement in the Ras al-Amoud section of Arab East Jerusalem.

* With some 300 Hamas followers detained by the Palestinian Authority, the Izzidin Qassem Brigades, the armed wing of Hamas, warned it might be forced to target Palestinian security forces.

Nov. 3: Saudi King Fahd told U.S. Defense Secretary William Cohen the U.S. could not use Saudi Arabia as a "springboard" for attacks on Iraq. Pentagon officials said the U.S. had sufficient forces and firepower in the Gulf to launch an attack within days.

* Palestinian officials reacted angrily to Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu's announcement that he would not convene his cabinet to ratify the Wye agreement until Palestinians agree to arrest 30 fugitives as part of a crackdown on Islamic militants.

* Lebanese Foreign Minister Faris Bouez asked the U.N. and the European Union to halt Israel's theft of topsoil from occupied southern Lebanon, where since September U.N. peacekeeping troops had observed Israeli civilians loading the soil onto trucks and taking it into northern Israel for use in new agricultural terraces.

Nov. 4: As the U.S. indicted Saudi dissident Osama bin Laden and his top military commander, Mohammed Atef, on 224 counts of conspiracy to commit murder in the August bombings of the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, Saudi interior minister Prince Nayef said bin Laden was not directly responsible for the 1996 bombing of the Khobar Towers in Dhahran that killed 19 American servicemen.

* A week after Vatican foreign minister Archbishop Jean-Louis Tauran angered Israeli authorities by describing Jewish settlements in Arab East Jerusalem as "an illegal occupation," Israeli ambassador to the Vatican Aharon Lopez urged the Holy See to wait 50 years before proceeding with any plan to beatify Pope Pius XII, criticized by Jewish groups for not doing enough to save Jews during World War II.

Nov. 5: As the Israeli cabinet finally convened to debate the Wye agreement, Prime Minister Netanyahu issued a new demand that the Palestinians formally revoke charter language calling for the destruction of Israel.

* U.S. President Bill Clinton said Iraq must immediately comply with U.N. demands or face a possible military strike. Meanwhile, the U.N. Security Council voted unanimously to condemn Iraq and demand that Baghdad resume cooperation with U.N. weapons inspectors, but neither authorized nor mentioned the use of force.

* Yugoslavia denied visas to members of a U.N. fact-finding mission seeking to investigate alleged atrocities in Kosovo.

* Indian and Pakistani negotiators, opening six days of talks, deadlocked on a water-sharing dispute over a river in Kashmir.

Nov. 6: The Israeli cabinet suspended consideration of the Wye agreement after a car bomb exploded outside a Jerusalem market, injuring 24 people.

* President Clinton lifted some of the economic and military sanctions imposed on India and Pakistan after their May nuclear tests.

Nov. 7: The militant Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility for the previous day's bombing of a Jerusalem market and warned of further attacks.

* The Cypriot ambassador to Israel, Euripides Evriviades, indicated that two Israelis arrested in Cyprus on suspicion of spying on Greek Cypriot military positions may have been working on behalf of Turkey.

Nov. 8: As Israel demanded that the Palestinian Authority outlaw the miltary wings of Hamas and Islamic Jihad, leaders of 10 radical Palestinian groups said in Damascas they would boycott any meeting convened to rewrite the PLO charter, and called for the election of a new parliament.

* Turkey said it had sent troops into Kurdish-held northern Iraq in pursuit of Kurdish Workers' Party rebels.

* The day after club-wielding Azerbaijani police broke up an opposition rally in Baku, injuring 18 people, an unidentified gang attacked a second rally, wounding several opposition leaders, including former President Abulfaz Eichibey, as police watched.

Nov. 9: Israel said it would probably miss the Wye agreement's Nov. 16 deadline for its first phased withdrawal from additional West Bank lands.

* As the Clinton administration indicated it was considering a quick response to Iraq's non-cooperation with U.N. weapons inspections, the Pentagon began building up U.S. forces in the Arabian/Persian Gulf.

Nov. 10: The State Department ruled out negotiations as a way of resolving Iraq's latest defiance of U.N. weapons inspections.

Nov. 11: The Israeli cabinet, after a nearly two-week delay, ratified the Wye agreement, but attached a list of new demands, including the repeal of clauses in the Palestinian charter calling for the destruction of Israel.

* As eight Arab countries called on Iraq to resume compliance with U.N. inspections, the Pentagon authorized a major buildup of U.S. forces in the Gulf.

* The Clinton administration confirmed reports that CIA director George Tenet threatened to resign if Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu's demand that convicted spy Jonathan Jay Pollard be pardoned was met as part of the Wye agreement. White House counsel Charles Ruff, rather than the Justice Department, was placed in charge of the promised review of Pollard's status.

Nov. 12: Less than 24 hours after it approved the Wye agreement, the Israeli government approved the release of bids for construction of the Har Homa settlement at Jabal Abu Ghneim.

Nov. 13: U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan made a last-ditch appeal to President Saddam Hussain to end Iraq's defiance of U.N. weapons inspections.

* The Palestinian Authority rejected the Israeli cabinet's additional conditions to the Wye agreement.

* As India and Pakistan concluded six days of talks on normalizing relations by agreeing to allow passenger bus service to operate between the two neighbors, the U.S. imposed trade restrictions on more than 300 Indian and Pakistani companies and government agencies in response to the two countries' May nuclear tests.

* The U.S. Embassy in Nairobi, Kenya reopened three months after it was blown up by a truck bomb.

* PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan was arrested in Italy.

Nov. 14: U.S. airstrikes on Iraq, reportedly just hours away, were postponed after President Saddam Hussain pledged in a letter to U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan to resume full and unconditional cooperation with weapons inspectors. The U.S. rejected a list of conditions attached to the letter, warning that strikes would be launched soon unless Baghdad dropped them.

* Citing his inflammatory rhetoric and interference in Bosnian internal affairs, the Office of the U.N. High Representative of Bosnia expelled Serbian Deputy Prime Minister Vojislav Seselj, leader of the ultranationalist Serbian Radical Party, from Bosnia.

* As Italy debated whether to grant political asylum to PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan, hundreds of Kurds marched through Rome to protest his arrest.

Nov. 15: President Clinton called off military action against Iraq after Baghdad dropped its conditions for resuming cooperation with U.N. weapons inspections.

* As Israeli Foreign Minister Ariel Sharon called upon Israeli settlers to "grab more hills, expand the territory" in the West Bank before a permanent territorial agreement is reached, Palestinian President Arafat, warning that "our rifle is ready," reiterated his pledge to declare a Palestinian state next May 4, the deadline for the completion of the Oslo accords.

* Yugoslav soldiers fired a machine gun over a car containing U.S diplomatic observers in the Kosovo capital of Pristina.

Nov. 16: Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu announced he was suspending implementation of the Wye accord until Palestinian President Arafat retracted his commitment to declaring a Palestinian state next May.

* As Turkey demanded the extradition of PKK leader Ocalan, Italian Prime Minister Massimo D'Alema said the matter would be decided by the Italian courts. Italian law forbids extradition to countries with the death penalty, such as Turkey and the U.S.

Nov. 17: By a vote of 75-19, the Israeli Knesset approved the Wye agreement, following President Arafat's reassurance that the Palestinian Authority wants "to solve these issues by peaceful means, through negotiations, and not in any other way."

* An Israeli court ruled against convicted spy Jonathan Jay Pollard's attempt to block Israel's release of Palestinian prisoners until Pollard is freed from the U.S. federal prison where he is being held for espionage.

Nov. 18: In their first meeting in two and a half years, Israeli and Palestinian negotiators agreed to formally resume suspended peace talks, while Palestinian police said they would begin confiscating illegal weapons the following week in compliance with the Wye agreement.

* Serbian President Milan Milutinovic rejected a U.N. plan for the future of Kosovo, saying it gave too much power to the ethnic Albanian majority.

* U.N. weapons inspections resumed in Iraq without incident.

Nov. 19: As U.S. Secretary of Commerce William Daley convened Palestinian-Jordanian-Israeli economic talks, the Israeli cabinet approved the first of three scheduled troop withdrawals from the West Bank in nearly two years.

Nov. 20: Israeli occupation troops withdrew from 200 square miles of the West Bank.

* Iraqi officials refused to hand over documents on chemical and biological weapons and missile systems to U.N. inspectors.

* The Clinton administration accused Yugoslav President Milosevic of violating the agreement on Kosovo, and warned of possible NATO military action.

* Afghanistan's ruling Taliban militia declared Saudi dissident Osama bin Laden innocent of involvement in the bombing of U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania.

Nov. 21: The Palestinian Authority accused Israel of violating the Wye agreement by releasing 150 car thieves and other criminals instead of political prisoners.

* An Italian court of appeals rejected Turkey's demand for the extradition of PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan, who was scheduled to be placed under house arrest while his request for political asylum is considered.

Nov. 22: Israeli Finance Minister Yaacov Neeman met in Washington with Undersecretary of State Stuart Eizenstat and Assistant Secretary of State and former U.S. Ambassador to Israel Martin Indyk to officially request an additional $1.2 billion in U.S. aid to pay for the redeployment of Israeli troops and installations from the West Bank as part of the Wye agreement.

* Palestinian political prisoners being held in Israeli jails began a hunger strike to demand their release as part of the Wye agreement.

* Calling U.N. chief weapons inspector Richard Butler's demand for documents on Iraq's chemical, biological and missile capacities "provocative," Deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz declared Baghdad "cannot provide documents that do not exist."

* Turkey retaliated against Italy for refusing to extradite PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan by barring Italian firms from any Turkish defense contracts.

* Iranian opposition leader Dariush Forouhar and his wife Parvaneh, both critics of their government's abuses of human and political rights, were found stabbed to death in their home in Tehran.

Nov. 23: Izzat Ibrahim, vice chairman of Iraq's ruling Revolutionary Command Council and second in command to the Iraqi president, escaped an assassination attempt on a visit to a Shi'i Muslim holy site south of Baghdad. In London, dissident Iraqi exile groups asked the U.S. and Britain to establish a sanctuary inside Iraq where they could set up an opposition government and instigate an internal uprising against Saddam Hussain.

* A bus carrying American businessmen, who had been accused by the hard-line Iranian press of being CIA officials disguised as tourists, was attacked by assailants shouting anti-American slogans.

Nov. 24: The arrival of an Egypt Air flight inaugurated the opening of the Gaza International Airport following two years of disputes with Israel, resolved when Israel gained control over which countries can fly to and from Gaza.

* The head of Israel's Mossad, known only as "Y," resigned following the arrest of two agents in Cyprus engaged in the third botched Mossad mission this year.

* Lebanese Gen. Emile Lahoud assumed his country's presidency.

* Following intervention by U.S. diplomats, ethnic Albanian rebels in Kosovo released Goran Zbiljic, a Serbian police officer they had kidnapped a week ago.

* Russia, Kazakhstan and major international oil companies agreed to build a multimillion-dollar pipeline from the Tengiz oil field to the Russian port of Novorossiysk on the Black Sea.

Nov. 25: Turkish Prime Minister Mesut Yilmaz submitted his resignation to President Suleyman Demirel after losing a no-confidence vote in parliament over allegations that he used his office to help an Istanbul businessman with criminal ties acquire a state-owned bank.

* Iranian President Mohammed Khatami, speaking to a group of newspaper publishers which included critics of his government, called for tolerance of freedom of thought.

Nov. 26: Four Israeli soldiers were killed in two attacks in occupied southern Lebanon.

* Defusing a possible confrontation with Turkey's powerful military, Islamist Virtue Party leader Recai Kutan said his party would not insist on its right to be asked to form a new government. In southeastern Turkey, PKK guerrillas sabotaged a government-owned oil pipeline, setting fire to an estimated 50 tons of crude oil.

* OPEC ministers ended a heated meeting without agreeing on a unified response to falling world oil prices.

Nov. 27: Germany declined to request the extradition of PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan from Italy, saying the Kurdish guerrilla should be tried by an international court.

* PKK guerrillas in southeastern Turkey shot down a Turkish army helicopter, killing 16 troops.

Nov. 28: Palestinians protesting Israel's failure to release political prisoners clashed with Israeli soldiers in Bethlehem, Hebron and East Jerusalem.

Nov. 29: As Israeli warplanes and artillery attacked suspected guerrilla positions near the Israeli-occupied "security zone" in southern Lebanon, and some cabinet members called for military strikes against Beirut's power and water supplies, U.S. Ambassador to Israel Edward Walker warned Prime Minister Netanyahu against harsh retaliation for the recent deaths of Israeli soldiers in southern Lebanon.

* Israel's Defense Ministry took delivery of the first Arrow anti-missile missile, funded primarily by the United States.

* Saying "the problem...here is the one between Turkey and its citizens of Kurdish origin," caretaker Prime Minister Mesut Yilmaz rejected German and Italian proposals for PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan to be tried before an international court.

Nov. 30: At an international donor conference in Washington, DC, the U.S. pledged an additional $400 million, for a total of $900 million over five years, to the Palestinian National Authority. Other pledges came from the EU, $480 million; Japan, $200 million; Norway, $175 million; Saudi Arabia, $100 million; Kuwait, $80 million; and Canada, $30 million--totaling some $3 billion in pledges.

* The Palestinian Bureau of Statistics released conservative census projections estimating a near tripling of the Palestinian population in the next generation, from 2.6 million in 1998 to 7.4 million in 2025.

* As Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu expressed willingness to reopen peace talks with Syria, Defense Minister Yitzhak Mordechai ruled out Israeli withdrawal from southern Lebanon, while U.S. Ambassador to Lebanon David Satterfield delivered a message from Secretary of State Albright urging "restraint on the part of all parties in southern Lebanon."

* Some 3,000 people reportedly were detained, 120 jailed and countless others tortured and beaten in Turkey's two-week-old crackdown on its largest pro-Kurdish party, the People's Democracy Party,

* Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri formally declined to head the new government under President Emile Lahoud.

* A German court approved the extradition to the U.S. of Mamdouh Mahmud Salim, allegedly a top aide to Saudi dissident Osama bin Laden.