Mideast Talks Slow on Eve of Clinton’s Return

THURMONT, Md. — On the 12th day of the Middle East peace summit, Secretary of State Madeleine Albright had lunch with Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat, while lower-level officials discussed a range of issues.

The pace of the Camp David talks slowed Saturday because of the Jewish Sabbath. Details of the discussions were not disclosed.

President Clinton, who left the talks early Thursday to attend the summit of industrialized nations in Japan, was expected to return home this afternoon.

Friction in the Israeli delegation burst into the open Saturday when Prime Minister Ehud Barak publicly rebuked his aides for bad-mouthing two senior ministers.

Barak issued a letter denying Israeli media reports attributed to his entourage that the only two ministers in the negotiating team--Amnon Lipkin-Shahak and Shlomo Ben-Ami--were pressuring him to make more concessions on Jerusalem, the main stumbling block in the talks.

It was the second time in two days that Israeli officials had sought to backpedal on statements that appeared to have been authorized by the prime minister.

On Friday, Rabbi Michael Melchior, a Cabinet minister, said that Barak had accepted a U.S. proposal to share sovereignty in some parts of Arab East Jerusalem.

Hours later, Melchior partially retracted his remarks.

Meanwhile, hundreds of Palestinians demonstrated Saturday in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, urging Arafat to hold out at the summit for the return of the Palestinian refugees and for a Palestinian capital in Jerusalem.

About 1,500 members of the militant Hamas organization rallied in Gaza City.