SPECIAL REPORT MIDEAST PEACE CONFERENCE
Continued from preceding page
changed unexpectedly, and the pro-
cess became relatively easy."
That mechanism involves a series
of steps designed to provide a little
symbolic something for everyone —
an international forum for the Arab
nations that have demanded that
kind of forum, direct bilateral nego-
tiations designed to satisfy a key Is-
raeli demand, regional talks aimed
at untangling some of the stickier
problems that contribute to the
endless tensions of the Middle East.
The first phase in the process in-
volves the October 30 meetings in
Madrid, to be hosted by President
George Bush and Soviet President
Mikhail Gorbachev. Those meet-
ings, which are expected to allow the
foreign ministers of participating
countries a chance to set out their
respective agendas, could prove to
be a minefield. A variety of factors,
including an Israeli uproar. should
Jerusalem decide that the list of
Palestinian representatives is too
closely tied to the Palestine Libera-
tion Organization, could prompt a
walkout by any of the major parties.
Administration officials are also
increasingly fearful that extremists
— in the Arab world or in Israel —
may strike as the opening of the
Fears persist that
extremists on both sides
will attempt to derail the
conference through some
violent action.
conference nears. Passions stirred
up by a serious incident could bring
the initial meetings to a screeching
halt.
The next major task for the ad-
ministration will be to finesse the
transition from the opening ses-
sions, at which no substantive nego-
tiations will take place, to the round
of bilateral discussions between Is-
rael and Syria; Israel and a joint
Palestinian-Jordanian delegation,
and Israel and Lebanon. "The meat
and potatoes of the process are the
bilateral discussions," said Marvin
Feuerwerger, senior strategic Mid-
dle East analyst with the Washing-
ton Institute for Near East Policy.
"In any of these committees, when
one reaches issues of substance,
they could break down. There are a
host of factors that could make this
a very difficult transition."
Weeks worth of frantic planning
by Mr. Baker and his team may
have provided the raw materials for
building a bridge from the first
30
FRIDAY, OCTOBER 25, 1991
phase to the bilateral talks, he said.
But how that bridge will ultimately
look —and how sturdy it will prove
in the face of violent pressures from
all sides — is a question that nobody
in the administration is prepared to
answer.
Mr. Baker is using both incentives
and threats to push participants
over this hump.
For the Syrians, the administra-
tion is holding out the prospect of
normalized relations, something
President Hafez al-Assad desperate-
ly needs now that the Soviet Union
is no longer a player in the Middle
East. To keep Syria on the playing
field, the administration has chosen
to overlook a variety of Syrian in-
fractions, including Mr. Assad's de-
cision to boycott the regional talks
that serve as the third stage of the
peace process and the consistent
charges that Syria has played a role
in a number of terrorist incidents,
including the bombing of Pan Am
103 several years ago.
That administration tactic has led
to concern among many pro-Israel
activists that the administration is
losing its ability to act as an
"honest broker" because of a tilt
toward Damascus.
But administration sources main-
tain that the decision to cut Syria
some extra slack was a purely
pragmatic one designed to increase
the likelihood that the peace process
will make it to the bilateral stage.
For Israel, the inducements are
also threats. In a variety of ways,
the administration continues to
make it clear that the badly needed
$10 billion in loan guarantees, as
well as future U.S. aid, are linked to
Israel's participation in the peace
process.
Despite its heavy political in-
vestment in the peace process, the
White House is bringing limited ex-
pectations to the first stages of the
peace talks.
In fact, the real substance — es-
pecially in the Israeli-Syrian bilat-
eral talks — may come in behind-
the-scenes discussions between the
two countries that could last many
months, administration officials be-
lieve.
"I don't expect the formal negoti-
ations will yield much right away,"
said Mr. Quandt. "But there are
some prospects for understandings
being reached. This has happened
before, through secret diplomacies.
They may choose that method of
trying to build the foundations of
peace. The formal negotiations
could provide the cover for that pro-
cess." Ei
.
In Israel,
The Mood
Is Somber
There is an air of
resignation and worry,
rather than celebration.
INA FRIEDMAN
Special to The Jewish News
erusalem — "Gang Rape in
Reverse" read a front-page
headline in Ha'aretz, Is-
rael's most prestigious daily,
summing up Secretary of State
James Baker's successful effort to
bring the five parties — Israel, Syria,
Lebanon, Jordan, and the Pales-
tinians — to the conference table in
Madrid on October 30th. And that
seemed to be the majority view
in Israel: the United States has es-
sentially forced its will on all the
participants; there was no other way
to make it happen.
No air of celebration could be de-
tected in Israel when, on a golden
autumn afternoon just before the
onset of the Sabbath, Mr. Baker fi-
nally extended the American-Soviet
invitation to the peace conference.
No horns honked on the streets, no
lights or "V" signs flashed, no whis-
tles or shouts could be heard. In-
stead, Israelis took the news in their
stride, almost with a shrug, and the
strongest response in most quarters
seemed to be skepticism that any-
thing good would come out of the
parley in Madrid.
Actually, it would be surprising if
the reaction were otherwise, given
the steady stream of bad news and
grim messages coming over the me-
dia for the past month or so. Just
days before Mr. Baker arrived on his
eighth round of talks in the region,
Yossi Ben-Aharon, director of the
Prime Minister's Office and the man
widely believed to reflect Yitzhak
Shamir's thinking, told an inter-
viewer that "it would be no trage-
dy" if the conference failed to con-
vene.
hill
_Ina Friedman reports frequently for us
from Jerusalem.
For weeks now, Likud minister
Ariel Sharon and his colleagues fur-
ther to the right (in the Tehiya and
Moledet parties) have been poun-
ding away at the message that the
proposed negotiations will bring di-
saster down upon Israel, while the
opposition has been caught in the
trap of wanting a peace conference
but being loath to recommend it
now for fear that if it actually does
come off, Mr. Shamir and his Likud
Party will reap all the credit.
Other factors chilling the mood
and raising anxieties have been a
new outbreak of stabbings and oth-
er political violence and reports of
what sounds suspiciously like a
government-inspired campaign of
"Israel-bashing" in the United
States.
Ever since last month's tiff with
President Bush over $10 billion in
loan guarantees to settle Soviet
immigrants, Israel has come in for
one punch after the another: the
sudden assault in the American
press on its fiscal credibility, the
administration's rebuke for conduc-
ting intelligence flights over west-
ern Iraq, Washington's warning not
to interfere with a ship carrying Ko-
rean Scud missiles to Syria, and
even dark intimations that, after
Iraq, Israel is next in line to effec-
tively be stripped of its nuclear po-
tential.
Add this to reports of a steep slide
in support for Israel in American
public-opinion polls and word of de-
fections even among the American-
Jewish leadership and it is easy to
understand why Israelis are grow-
ing anywhere from concerned to
disgruntled. Some have even been
tempted to wonder, aloud, whether
the United States can still qualify as
an "honest broker" in the peace
process and whether the Americans
haven't perhaps overdone their
"even-handedness." Washington
has not only retreated from its
"special relationship" with Israel
but turned Yitzhak Shamir's gov-
ernment into a whipping boy.
The cumulative effect of the past