By Mark Heinrich VIENNA, April 4 (Reuters) - The Palestinian foreign minister said on Wednesday that Israel's call for a conference with Arabs sidestepping their land-for-peace offer suggested the Jewish state wanted normal ties without giving up anything in return. Ziad Abu Amr was commenting on Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's proposal for an alternative to U.S.-backed plans for talks through an Arab League working group that could try to flesh out details of the proposed peace accord with Israel. "If Mr Olmert told us he accepted the (principle) of land for peace, and that he is ready to take up negotiations in this regard and to end the occupation based on this peace initiative, I think nothing more would stand in the way," Abu Amr told journalists in Vienna. "I don't think Mr Olmert is really ready to engage in genuine, serious negotiations with the Arabs...," he said at a news conference after talks with his Austrian counterpart Ursula Plassnik. Conceived by Riyadh, the plan offers Israel normal ties with all Arab states in return for full withdrawal from the lands it occupied in the 1967 Middle East war, creation of a Palestinian state and a "just solution" for Palestinian refugees. Saudi Arabia, which last month hosted an Arab summit that resuscitated the 5-year-old peace plan, said the kingdom would consider talks only if Israel clearly accepted the Arab initiative without preconditions. The United States, Egypt and other countries have been pressing Olmert to agree to hold talks as soon as possible with the planned Arab League group, but he has been reluctant to do so, said senior diplomats involved in the matter. One said Olmert was proposing a regional conference only because he knew it was a non-starter. "The Arab peace initiative is strong, powerful, clear and honest, a real litmus test to all those who are seriously interested in peace in the region," Abu Amr said. "Those who shrink from this initiative are not truly interested." Olmert has said he sees positive points in the Arab proposal to resolve almost 60 years of Middle East conflict. But Israel, citing demographic and security concerns, opposes the return of Palestinian refugees to their former homes in what is now the Jewish state. It also wants to retain its largest settlement blocs in the occupied West Bank.
