Middle East: Toward the Start of Talks

GUNNAR JARRING, who is known as "the Silent Swede," suddenly found himself cornered one day last week by a group of reporters near his office on the 38th floor of the United Nations Secretariat building in Manhattan. Pelted with questions about the Arab-Israeli discussions that he has been summoned to conduct on behalf of U.N. Secretary-General U Thant, the Swedish diplomat recited an aphorism in Hindi, one of a dozen languages that he knows. Then he translated it: "All is all right." With customary caution, Jarring immediately added, "I mean that only personally."

The situation was beginning to improve professionally, too. To be sure, the Israeli-Egyptian cease-fire remained as tenuous as ever, and Israel continued to accuse the Egyptians of violating the agreement that barred the introduction of new weapons into the 32-mile-wide strip along either side of the Suez. But the truce was more than two weeks old, and it had not been seriously broken by gunfire along the canal. Even more important, both Israel and Egypt quietly began to formulate their bargaining positions. Unless an unforeseen hitch developed, both Israel and Egypt expected the talks to begin this week.

American Promises. Israel broke the log jam by notifying Jarring that it was ready to compromise on the formal details of the talks. Originally, the government of Premier Golda Meir favored holding ministerial-level discussions somewhere close to the Middle East, perhaps on Cyprus; the Egyptians wanted the representatives to be of ambassadorial rank and the site to be New York. Israel finally agreed to New York meetings and said that the preliminary sessions could be handled by ambassadors. As its part of the bargain, the Israeli Cabinet was expected to nominate U.N. Ambassador Yosef Tekoah as its representative. But when the talks reach substantive issues, the negotiating rank probably will be upgraded to the ministerial level. By then, the foreign ministers of the countries involved are scheduled to be in New York attending the U.N. General Assembly, which convenes Sept. 15.

Israel's decision to compromise on negotiation arrangements eased growing tension between Washington and Jerusalem. Fearful of losing the Soviet-Egyptian support that made the ceasefire possible, U.S. diplomats complained that Israel protested far too loudly about the alleged truce violations. Israel became anxious that the U.S. was hedging on its promise to maintain Israeli military superiority in the Middle East. The Israelis took particular offense at Secretary of Defense Melvin Laird's remark that the U.S. possessed better intelligence than Israel.

The State Department, in an announcement that a U.S. official said had been drafted "with greater care than the Bible's chapter on the Creation," did much to soothe Israeli feeling. The U.S. statement conceded the possibility that an Egyptian violation had occurred, while insisting that the evidence was not conclusive. More important, the U.S. made "very specific" promises to Israel that Washington would not allow it to suffer militarily as a result of the ceasefire; in fact, the U.S. has already sent some new electronic anti-missile gear to the Israeli air force. Israel got in one last psychological lick by making public its intelligence photos of the alleged violations (see box opposite). But Golda Meir also decided to pay heed to the U.S. pronouncement that "the main thing now is to concentrate all efforts on getting discussions going."

In contrast to the canal, sporadic fighting continued on other Israel-Arab fronts, where there was still no ceasefire in effect. Israeli farm settlements in the Jordan valley were under almost nightly Katyusha rocket attack, and fedayeen commandos killed two soldiers in an army outpost on the Lebanese border. Israel sent bombers against fedayeen positions on the foothills of Mount Hermon and in Jordan. It also dispatched troops on a short foray into southern Lebanon, where the raiders blew up three houses suspected of serving as fedayeen bases.

Possible Offers. Under the terms of the truce agreement, the Jarring talks will be indirect negotiations, each side meeting separately with the U.N. diplomat. His job will be to receive both Arab and Israeli delegations and to explain each one's position to the other. One item of early business is certain to be an exchange of prisoners. Israel is eager to secure the return of its 16 Nationals held as prisoners of war (twelve by Egypt, three by Syria and one by Al-Fatah in Jordan). Israel is holding 119 Arabs, including two prominent Algerians taken last week from an international jetliner during a stopover at Tel Aviv's airport.

When they turn to the major issues, negotiators from each side will probably spend many hours trying to pin down the other side's concept of a final settlement. For the Israelis, this means determining whether the Arabs will listen to discussions aimed toward formal recognition and secure borders for Israel, or whether they would agree only to a more vague armistice. For the Arabs, it means ferreting out how much occupied territory Israel is willing to return.

Neither side has yet drafted any formal proposals. Nonetheless, each is actively debating various possibilities. In return for a formal peace treaty that will guarantee Israel's security against renewed Arab attacks, the Israelis are seriously considering large territorial settlements. If the areas involved were demilitarized, they might return almost all the Sinai Peninsula to Egypt, give back much of the Golan Heights to Syria, create a Palestinian state on the Israeli-occupied West Bank and in the Gaza Strip, and establish Jerusalem as a jointly managed united city in which Arab residents would administer their own municipal affairs. But if the Arabs are not willing to bargain on a final peaceful settlement, Israel's offer will likely be far less liberal in giving up occupied areas (see map).

Palestinian State. Of course not even Israel's most conciliatory plan would be acceptable to many Arabs. Arab moderates, however, are inclined to agree with Israel's most liberal suggestions for Jerusalem and Gaza, but even the moderates would insist on a U.N. or four-power military presence in those areas, like the strip of land from Eilat to Sharm el Sheikh, that Israel would like to patrol by itself.

The notion of the creation of a Palestinian state on the West Bank, which could serve as a home for the Palestinian refugees, has lately drawn particular interest from some Arabs. In recent weeks, King Hussein has reportedly held private meetings with West Bank politicians who came from the occupied area to talk with him. Many of them, weary of their long and losing struggle against Israel, were said to have reacted favorably to the idea of founding a demilitarized Arab state.

In Cairo, President Gamal Abdel Nasser last week held a strategy session with King Hussein, whose retinue included an important possible mediator for the Arabs' own internal quarrels. He is former Jordanian Prime Minister Suleiman Nabulsi, a Palestinian moderate who is a confidant of both Hussein and the fedayeen commando groups based in Jordan. Nabulsi is believed to have ambitions of becoming leader of a Palestinian state that might result from a Middle East settlement. But it is extremely unlikely that he could persuade the more violent element of the guerrillas, led by Dr. George Habash's Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, to accept a compromise of peaceful coexistence with Israel. Still, the fate of the Palestinian refugees, who now number some 1,250,000, lies at the very center of the Middle East dilemma.

At week's end the good will necessary for productive talks was still painfully scarce. The U.S. was evaluating new intelligence from its own monitors indicating that recent violations had occurred on the Egyptian side. If verified, the violations could lead to a new round of charges and countercharges--and new delays in the talks. For the moment, the U.S. was hopeful that the Israelis and Arabs would not let their differences prevent the start of the bargaining process.

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