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Relations between Washington and Jerusalem were tense throughout most of the year, as Secretary of State Baker applied pressure on
Israeli Prime Minister Shamir to agree to participate in the Mideast peace conference.
The Tortuous Path Toward Peace
f Israel's leaders want to
make peace, an
uncharacteristically petulant
Secretary of State James
Baker told a Congressional
committee earlier this year, they
know the White House phone
number.
Mr. Baker had returned empty-
handed from one of several post-
Gulf War Mideast diplomatic visits,
and though he had also been
I
rebuffed by Syria, the Secretary of
State singled out Israel as the
cause for lack of progress toward
peace talks.
He and President Bush were fed
up with what they perceived to be
Israel's refusal to cooperate in
Washington's efforts to bring about
a peace conference.
Israel, for its part, was upset
that the United States chose to
view Israel as the heavy when, in
Jerusalem's view, the events
leading to the Gulf War, and the
war itself, only proved the
correctness of Mr. Shamir's
reluctance to trade territory for
Arab peace promises.
Israel asserted that the Iraqi
invasion of Kuwait underscored
that the Mideast problem was far
more than an Arab-Israeli conflict.
When Jordan and the Palestine
Liberation Organization sided with
Saddam, and when Palestinians
cheered as Iraqi Scuds fell on
Israeli civilian population centers,
Mr. Shamir asked, in effect, "Are
these the people Washington wants
us to make concessions to?"
Israel resented being kept out of
the allied coalition (for fear of
offending the Arab partners) and
being urged to refrain from
responding militarily to the Scud
attacks during the war, but
complied to Washington's requests.
After the war, though, rather
than being rewarded for suffering
in silence, Israel was immediately
pressured by the administration, as
part of its "new world order," to
make concessions so that peace
talks could begin.
In addition, the administration
was threatening to withhold a
vital $10 billion loan guarantee for
Israel, to help resettle Soviet Jews,
unless Israel promised not to build
settlements in the occupied
territories.
Israel insisted that the loan
guarantee was a humanitarian, not
a political, issue and geared up for
a major confrontation in Congress
later this month.
Mr. Baker's tireless Mideast
diplomacy seemed to pay off when
Syrian president Assad signed on,
putting the onus on Mr. Shamir,
who then responded with a
qualified "yes," insisting that no
East Jerusalem Arabs be allowed
to participate.
This was a peace conference that
no one seemed to want to attend,
but no one could afford not to.
Unless, of course, the Palestinians
refused to cooperate and threw the
Washington game-plan off.
Even the drama of an historic
Mideast peace conference,
tentatively scheduled for October,
was eclipsed by the collapse of
Communism in the Soviet Union,
and there are still any number of '
ways the peace talks could fail.
Israelis were divided, not
surprisingly, in their views. An
overwhelming majority favored the
talks, and almost as many said
Israel should not give up the Golan
Heights, which Syria covets, in
return for pledges of peace.
In other words, talk — but don't
make concessions.
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THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS
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