The Muddle Worsens

Tra e Talks

Jordan Valley residents wonder
if they are being negotiated away.

GIL SEDAN

Jewish Telegraphic Agency

n

the talks, first in Stockholm and now at an undis-
closed location in the Middle East, have been
conducted out of the public eye.

Jerusalem

ardly a person in the Jordan Valley felt
much like celebrating the 33rd anniversary
of the Six-Day War — the war which gave
Israel control over the entire West Bank.
On June 5 this week, the anniversary of the war's
beginning, Mordechai Dahaman, the head of the
regional council of Megilot in the Jordan Valley, sat in
his office and said the war was not actually over yet.
The final battle was still raging, and the 5,000
Jewish settlers in the Jordan Valley were not really
ready for it.
"We thought we were part of a national consen-
sus that the Jordan Valley was not up for grabs,"
Dahaman said.
But these days, nobody is sure. Israeli Interior
Minister Natan Sharansky has accused Prime Minister
Ehud Barak of offering the Jordan Valley to the Pale-
stinians; sources close to the negotiations say it isn't so.

Barren To Bloom

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The Jordan Valley lies on both sides of the Jordan
River. The eastern bank is in Jordan. The western
side of the valley has been under Israeli control since
the Six-Day War.
Some 23 Jewish settlements have been erected in
the valley, in a narrow strip from Beit She'an in the
north to Ein Gedi by the Dead Sea.
Only several hundred Palestinians lived in the
region when Israel conquered the territory from
Jordan in 1967. By and large, the area was barren.
Israeli farmers developed the area into a center for
high-tech agriculture, and Jordanian farmers on the
other side of the border eventually followed suit.
"We came here from Ramat Hasharon 18 years
ago because we wanted to become farmers," said
Orit Artzieli, a mother of four from Petzael who,
like most of the residents of the area, supports the
Labor Party of Barak.
Through the years, Jordan Valley settlers differen-
tiated themselves from the West Bank settlers, who
were politically associated with the National
Religious Party and Likud. They even made a point
of calling themselves residents, rather than settlers.
Whether these Jordan Valley residents will some-
day find themselves under Palestinian rule is only
speculation at this point.
Very few people really know what's going on in
the Israeli-Palestinian negotiations.
U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright is in
the region this week to push the process along. But

Leading By Leaking

The secret nature of the talks has produced a large
amount of speculation and disinformation —
which is sometimes spread to serve various, some-
times conflicting, interests.
Leading Israeli columnist Nahum Barnea
explained last weekend in the newspaper Yediot
Achronot how it works:
Take Ahmed Karia, the speaker of the
Palestinian legislative council and the head of the
Palestinian negotiating team. According to Barnea,
Karia leaked information on Palestinian achieve-
ments in the talks to Likud leader Ariel Sharon.
Sharon, in turn, spread the word that the Israeli
g overnment is making major concessions. Karia col-
lected political credit in the Palestinian street —
and Israeli policy-makers found themselves facing
growing opposition, which gets together strange
bedfellows like the rightist settlers of the West Bank,
the left-leaning residents of the Jordan Valley and
the politically mixed settlers of the Golan.
Gabi Flexer, secretary of Kibbutz Kalia on the •
northern shore of the Dead Sea, is convinced that
Barak is the one who leaked the maps to the press.
"This is his way of testing public opinion," he said.
Both Barak and Palestinian Authority President
Yasser Arafat said this week that the gaps between
their positions are still too wide to reach an agree-
ment. But this did not prevent the rumors from
spreading.
Some say Barak is planning to give away 92 per-
cent of the West Bank — a figure that prompted
angry protests. "If, God forbid, he carries out this
dangerous plan, his days could be numbered," said
Shimon Riklin, the leader of a West Bank settlers'
organization, the Next Generation.
The Jordan Valley settlers believe that if 92 per-
cent is the real figure, then the Jordan Valley must
be part of the deal.
Flexer's theory is simple: For political reasons,
Barak will not be able to give up West Bank towns
like Ma'aleh Adumim near Jerusalem, and Ariel near
Nablus.
"When they can't fight the stronger ones, they
will turn to the weaker ones, like us," Flexer said.
"Our sources are totally reliable," said David Levy,
chairman of the Jordan Valley regional council. "We
know for sure that the plan, which is supposed to be
concluded at the end of this month, refers to giving
TRADE TALKS on page 27

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak meets with
U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright in
Jerusalem on June 5.

In Lim

impoth the peace process and the political

alliprocess in. Israel were in disarray last week.
U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright
had barely left the country after two days of
revving the peace talks when the Knesset, on
Wednesday, took a first step toward new elec-
tions. The move could put some of their jobs
at risk but more importantly could demolish
E
mheun.
dt Barak's 11-month-old coalition govern-

While early elections are far from a cer-
tainty — the measure could be delayed if
Barak cajoles a majority back in line — the
action made the backing for the peace process
seem even more uncertain. While talks with
Syria are off for the.moment, serious discus-
sions with Palestenian Authority chairman
Yasser Arafat have come to some new defini-
tions of the toughest issues, like what land
will be returned and in exchange for what.
But the talks can't progress if the
Palestinians don't believe Barak can get the
Knesset and the general public to deliver what
he pledges. Accompanying articles detail two
of the stickiest points for Israelis — the future
of Jerusalem and of the Jordan Valley.

— Jonathan Friendly,
National Editor

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