Saudi Arabia which footed another sixth of the bill felt the same way

Saudi Arabia, which footed another sixth of the bill, felt the same way about it.Not that the athletes looked very threatening. It's very miserable."The problem, of course, is that just seven years ago, the Iraqis turned up unexpectedly on another border in rather larger numbers. And when Kuwait decided that it was not Saddam's home, the Iraqi army invaded the emirate which now - liberated by America and its allies but still furious at Iraq's failure to return 600 missing citizens - has no intention of running, jumping or even standing still beside its former tormentors, especially in a stadium partly built with Kuwaiti money. "You know, it's not good to leave all these nice athletes under the sun here, without water, without anything. "Lebanon should say `our country is your home - we want to show you our hospitality'," he complained.

But no way would the Lebanese frontier guards open the road to Beirut and the shiny new sports stadium where President Elias Hrawi of Lebanon will today launch the pan-Arab games.Dr Mohamed Ridha, the Iraqi track coach (educated University of Colorado) asked why the Arab League had invited his team to the games without ensuring visas for them at the border. And Kuwait and Saudi Arabia were winning - though they were not the only players; Syria, Turkey, Israel, even the United States had their indirect role to play in the plight of the Iraqis marooned beside the frontier rubbish-tip at Masnaa.Surrounded by old tyres, rusting Pepsi cans and crushed cigarette packets, they prayed towards Mecca on their little rugs, or sat perspiring in their buses or paraded before the local television cameras in their tracksuits, brandishing the red-white-and-black Iraqi flag. The Lebanese, however, did not take so kindly to the 97 Iraqi athletes in their blue track-suits who dropped in to visit them yesterday. For after travelling for three days across the Iraqi and Syrian deserts to participate in Beirut's pan-Arab games, the sportsmen and women of Baghdad, Kirkuk and Basra were met by that most familiar of all pan-Arab greetings: no visa. "I will tell you something," one of them muttered to me darkly "This is a game." Indeed it was. The second bus, filled with Iraqi shot-putters, weightlifters and runners, bore a more peculiar portrait of the leader of the Arab Socialist Baath Party of Iraq: Saddam in a turban, inspecting a pot of meat on a domestic cooking stove while dropping in for a chat with local Baghdad residents. On the front of their bus, next to a photograph of Saddam Hussein wearing a stylish Bavarian hat, a handwritten notice declared the visitors to be "the elite of the Iraqi soccer team".

There were no pupils in the building because of of the summer holidays.. Israel was furious at recent comments by Ms Short on Palestinians, where she spoke of "the unfairness of the world's expectation that [Palestinians] should make sacrifices to make up for the evil done by Europeans during the Holocaust". As a sign of official displeasure, the Israeli ambassador stayed away from the ministerial meeting.Hebron, West Bank (AP) -- Palestinian demonstrators yesterday hurled stones, fire bombs and homemade explosives at Israeli soldiers.Twenty rioters were injured by rubber bullets fired by Israeli troops, including a 12-year-old child left partially paralysed by a head wound.Palestinians threw a pipe bomb into the courtyard of an elementary school that had been seized by soldiers as a lookout. The fragmented coalition could fall apart, any day." But he added a cautionary note, too: "Because it's so weak, it could survive."Mr Beilin held meetings this week with Mr Cook, the Foreign Secretary, and with Clare Short, Secretary of State for International Development.

"Nobody said: `It's a wonderful idea, let's roll up our sleeves.' But nobody threw me out of the window." He was sceptical about the chances of survival of the hawkish Benjamin Netanyahu and his government, saying: "It's almost a miracle that it still exists. -"The Americans have left the region - and have just left us some phone numbers where we can reach them." Without the intervention of a third party, Mr Beilin said, "I see the danger of an explosion".Mr Beilin said that the British government had given a cautious welcome to his proposals. But, he said, it was impossible "without a third party".This third party, he suggested, could be Britain, now that the United States has in effect withdrawn from its active role in the Middle East peace process. The Palestinian leadership, for its part, would do everything in its power to stop street violence. During that period, further talks would take place on redeployment of Israeli troops, together with "negotiations on a final solution" - including an agreement on borders.Mr Beilin argued that such a package deal might "fulfil the interests and expectations of both sides". People understand the ramifications of an explosion." The deal proposed by Mr Beilin is a half-way house package, which would create a political ceasefire, while at the same time allowing both sides to avoid committing themselves as talks continue behind closed doors.He insisted it was essential that such talks remain secret: "Reporting daily would be a prescription for failure." The existence of such talks, would, however, be public knowledge - unlike the talks which led to the breakthrough in the Oslo peace deal.In practice, however, it is therefore difficult to imagine that potentially damaging leaks would not take place from both sides.Mr Beilin suggested that Israel should "pause" for six months with its plans to build housing at the site known to Israelis as Har Homa. One of the architects of the Oslo peace accords spoke in London yesterday of the need to launch a new peace initiative in Israel, and argued that Britain could play a leading role.