Akademik

   Formally called the "Sharm el-Sheikh Fact-Finding Committee Report," its report was submitted to the White House on 30 April 2001 and issued on 21 May 2001. It was drafted by an international blue-ribbon committee of notables established after the October 2000 summit at Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, and was headed by former U.S. senator George Mitchell to investigate the causes of the outbreak of Palestinian violence (Al-Aksa intifada) in late September 2000. It called for an immediate cease-fire and the resumption of peace talks and cooperation between Israeli and Palestinian security officials on the ground; a freeze on Israeli settlement construction; and the lifting by Israel of economic restraints in Palestinian areas, even as it acknowledged that many of those restraints were being taken for security reasons. It called for further steps by the Palestinian Authority to prevent Palestinian attacks on Israelis, steps by Israel to limit the use of lethal force against Palestinians, and "100 percent effort" by Palestinians to rein in terrorism. Israel welcomed the Mitchell Committee Report, although it expressed a difference of opinion about the status of settlements, arguing that the continued expansion of settlements for "natural growth" was permitted under the Oslo Accords. The Palestinian side also welcomed the report but cited as a "deficiency" its failure to set forth how the commitments must be implemented.