JERUSALEM -- Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin ordered a review of plans to expand a Jewish settlement in the West Bank after Palestinians protested that it breached the Israel-PLO peace accord, officials said Wednesday.


Attorney General Michael Ben-Yair will probe the legal background of the disputed plot just south of Bethlehem, said Rabin spokesman Oded Ben-Ami.


He said that Rabin hoped to bring a legal opinion to his Cabinet for a vote Sunday on the future of the expansion.


Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat has spoken to Foreign Minister Shimon Peres about the issue twice since Tuesday, Palestinian officials said. They added that Arafat's self-rule Cabinet would convene in emergency session on the issue Wednesday evening.


Also Wednesday, Palestinian officials and a newspaper reported that Israeli settlers have started work on two other projects to expand settlements in the West Bank.


Al-Quds newspaper reported bulldozers have dug about 70 acres of land near the Arab village of Iskakah in the northern West Bank to expand the settlement of Ariel.


The press office of the Palestinian Authority said bulldozers Wednesday started work levelling land belonging to the Palestinian village of Safa.


The settlement dispute erupted last week when the Jewish settlement of Efrat in the Israeli-occupied West Bank sent bulldozers to pave a road to the barren hilltop area for a new neighborhood.


Since then, Palestinians and Israeli peace activists have clashed daily with Israeli troops protecting construction workers. A Palestinian Cabinet minister came to blows with soldiers at the site Tuesday.


The expansion has become a test of both Rabin's 1992 settlement freeze and of how far he will risk a showdown with the 120,000 settlers in the West Bank and Gaza. Some settlers have threatened violence to resist a withdrawal of Israeli forces envisaged in the next stage of the peace settlement with the Palestinians.


Arafat told reporters in Gaza Wednesday that Peres told him "that they have decided to stop it," referring to the bulldozer work at Al-Khader. The Palestinian village adjacent to Efrat claims the land was taken from them illegally.


Israel radio said that the settlers were asked to stop their work pending a Cabinet decision.


But Israeli officials denied issuing such instructions. Ben-Ami said the dispute was pending an attorney-general ruling on ownership and other unspecified legal aspects of the dispute.


Peres' spokeswoman Behira Burdugo said that the foreign minister only promised Arafat "to take action to calm the atmosphere."


Settlement officials argue that because of its private ownership, the plot was beyond the jurisdiction of a settlement freeze imposed by Rabin when he was elected in 1992.


"I am really angry," said Aharon Domb, West Bank settlement council spokesman. "Everything the Palestinians say, we must accept for fear the negotiations will explode."


A Palestinian family named Salah in Al-Khader also claims ownership.


Palestinian leaders say the construction further threatens the future of stalled negotiations over the next stage of Israeli-Palestinian peace, to expand the limited self-rule given the Gaza Strip and Jericho to the rest of the West Bank.


Israel has already balked at a troop pullback over concerns about mounting attacks by Islamic militants that have killed 32 Israelis since Oct. 1. The latest attack was a suicide bombing that wounded 12 people in Jerusalem Sunday.


The settlement expansion issue is complicated by the area's proximity to Jerusalem, which both Israel and the Palestinians want as their capital. Efrat is considered part of the Gush Etzion bloc, a site where Jewish fighters were massacred by Arabs during the 1948 war over Israel's creation. It's history means many Israelis want it to remain a permanent part of the state.


In a separate development, leaders from Egypt, Syria and Saudi Arabia met in Alexandria on Wednesday for a surprise regional mini-summit, Egyptian Information Minister Safwat Sherif said.


The summit, only acknowledged by Egypt after the arrival in Alexandria of Syrian President Hafez al-Assad, was aimed at "resolving Arab differences and coordinating effort towards solidarity," Sherif said.


The Middle East peace process, Arab relations and international issues were on the agenda, Sherif said.


Assad and King Fahd of Saudi Arabia arrived in the port city Wednesday and held separate meetings with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.


(Reuters, AP)