A reporter for the Haaretz daily accused of divulging secret military information returned to Israel on Sunday after spending several months abroad to avoid arrest, public television reported.

The newspaper had published a series of articles by Uri Blau on the Israeli military's controversial methods of operation in the occupied West Bank, using information passed to him by the secretary of a top general.

Anat Kam, 23, had access to the information during her military service between 2005 and 2007.

She has been charged with divulging secret documents with the intention of harming state security. Her trial began several months ago, and the next hearing is set for December.

Kam is accused of passing on around 2,000 documents classified as "Top Secret" when she was secretary to General Yair Naveh, who was the senior officer in charge of the West Bank.

She has confessed to acting for ideological reasons to denounce "war crimes."

After writing several articles based on the information passed to him, Blau moved to Britain while he negotiated with the authorities about his return.

Public television reported on Sunday that a deal had been struck between Shin Bet, the internal security service, and Blau's lawyer.

Under the agreement, Blau would return the classified documents in his possession and would submit himself to Shin Bet and police questioning.

The channel reported that he also agreed to undergo a lie detector test to prove that he no longer had any secret papers.

In one article based on the secret information, Blau wrote that Israeli soldiers had been ordered to kill activists of the hardline Palestinian militant group Islamic Jihad even if they had the chance to detain them.

earlier related report

Palestinian appeal to world bodies 'unrealistic': Netanyahu
Jerusalem (AFP) Oct 24, 2010 –

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday urged the Palestinians not to abandon stalled peace talks in favour of an "unrealistic" appeal to the international community.

"We expect the Palestinians to honour their commitment to hold direct negotiations," Netanyahu said at the start of a weekly cabinet meeting.

"I think that any attempt to bypass them by appealing to international bodies is unrealistic and will not give any impetus to a genuine diplomatic process," he said.

The United States convinced the two sides to relaunch direct peace talks in early September but the Palestinians suspended them later that month following the expiration of a partial Israeli settlement moratorium.

Palestinian officials have since said that if Israel does not impose a new freeze they may seek recognition of their promised state from the United States, the UN Security Council or the General Assembly.

Netanyahu said he was holding "intensive contacts with the American administration in order to restart the diplomatic process."

But he appeared to shy away from recent reports that US and Israeli negotiators have been discussing a raft of security and other incentives in exchange for a 60-day extension of the moratorium to allow the talks to resume.

"Our goal is not just to resume the process, but to advance it in such a way that it cannot be halted in a few weeks or months," he said.

After months of US shuttle diplomacy, Netanyahu and Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas relaunched the talks in Washington on September 2 with the goal of reaching a full peace deal within one year.

However they remain divided on the core issues of the conflict that have bedevilled past efforts to reach a deal, and the Palestinians view the settlement dispute as a crucial test of Israel's intentions.

They have long seen the presence of some 500,000 Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank and Arab east Jerusalem as a major obstacle to the establishment of a viable Palestinian state.

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