DOHA -- Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh said he favors sending weapons, men and money to the Palestinians to help their struggle against Israel's ongoing military offensive in the West Bank, AFP reported.

"Support for the "Intifada" comes by sending the Palestinians money, men, weapons and ammunition," Saleh told Qatar's Al-Jazeera television.

Saleh urged Egypt, Jordan and Mauritania to break diplomatic ties with Israel to help "stop Palestinian blood flowing," and demanded the "reactivation of the Arab Common Defense Treaty."

The United States must recognize Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon as a "terrorist and war criminal and treat him as such," Saleh added in his first appearance since cutting off contact with the outside world on March 31 in a protest at the "silence of Arab leaders" toward the crisis.

The president blasted U.S. "accusations of terrorism" against Palestinian Leader Yasser Arafat, saying it was "unacceptable" and would have "repercussions in the region on the U.S.-led anti-terror coalition."

But he expressed a hope that the upcoming visit to the region by U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell could lead to a "halt of the war of extermination on the Palestinian people and the withdrawal of Israeli forces" from Palestinian territory.

"If Powell fails in this mission, the whole world must admit that it's Israel that does not want peace and the U.S. must then prove its neutrality" in searching a peaceful settlement to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, he said.