The Michigan Daily-Wednesday, May 20, 1981-Page 5
HABIB MEETS WIT H SYRIAN AND ISR AELI LEADERS
Efforts to avert crisis clouded
JERUSALEM (AP)-U.S. envoy Philip Habib met
yesterday with the leaders of Syria and Israel, but his
effort to avert a showdown over Syria's missiles in
Lebanon was clouded by signs of Israeli impatience
and Syrian charges he was covering for an impending
Israeli attack.
Syria said it had shot down an unmanned Israeli
reconnaissance plane yesterday over the Syrian port
city of Latakia, 60 miles north of Syria's border with
Lebanon. A military spokesman said the craft was
similar to one downed last week over Lebanon.
ASKED ABOUT the report, an Israeli military
spokesman said, "It's completely denied."
Habib spent 22 hours with Syrian President Hafez
Assad in Damascus, then flew to Tel Aviv, spending
90 minutes with Israeli Prime Minister Menachem
Begin. After the meeting with Begin, he said "the
diplomatic efforts will continue."
It was the veteran American diplomat's third
round on the Syria-Israel shuttle he has been
traveling for 12 days.
BEGIN PRAISED Habib's "immense, perhaps
unexampled efforts" and said he would "convene the
appropriate authorities to take the appropriate
decisions."
The comments prompted speculation the U.S. en-
voy had made some progress, but neither Begin nor
Habib would answer questions, and there were other
signals yesterday that the issue was far from settled.
As Habib was meeting with Assad, Israeli Foreign
Minister Yitzbak Shamir was telling reporters in
Jerusalem that Israel will not wait indefinitely for
diplomacy to remove the Soviet-made anti-aircraft
missiles-that the Israeli air force will eventually be
called in.
"IT IS NOT a question of days or hours," Shamir
said, "but we cannot wait for months."
In Damascus, the government newspaper Al Baath
said Habib's mission was -a deception: "Habib is
preparing the grounds for a large-scale Israeli
aggression on Lebanon to partition that country,
liquidate the Palestinian cause and eventually invade
Syria."
Adding to the chilliness of Syria's treatment was'
Hassad's decision to keep Habib waiting for 20 hours
after his arrival in Damascus before seeing him.
An-Nahar, a Beirut newspaper, reported yesterday
that during a visit to Riyadh over the weekend, Habib
had obtained Saudi Arabia's backing for a four-point.
plan to defuse the missile crisis.
THE PLAN WAS said to call for gradual with-
drawal of the weapons in exchange for a moratorium
on Israeli flights over the area; peace talks under
U.S. auspices; a return to the Lebanese army control
of the strategic high country that Syria and the
Christians have been disputing; and resumption of
Saudi and Kuwaiti aid to Syria's force in Lebanon.
Syria's 22,000 soldiers in Lebanon are under an
Arab League mandate to enforce the armistice that
ended the 1975-76 civil war between Christians and a
coalition of Moslems and Palestinian guerrillas. But
the Christians say they have become an army of oc-
cupation. -
Israel's Begin, however, said Monday he doubts
Saudi Arabia will be of much help with the plan and
described it as "one of the most corrupt states in the
world."
ASKED ABOUT that yesterday, State Department
spokesman Dean Fishcer said, "We do believe that
this is a time when everyone concerned . . . should
restrain their rhetoric."
Israel's state-run radio said Begin would chair a
cabinet meeting-probably on Wednesday and
probably to discuss the peace plan.
The threat of war has hung over the Middle East
since Israel shot down two Syrian helicopter gunships
operating against the Lebanese Christians in eastern
Lebanon April 28. Syria responded the next day by
moving SAM-6 anti-aircraft missiles into the area.
President Reagan was reported yesterday to have
taken a personal role in the crisis. According to
deputy press secretary Larry Speakes, Reagan met
on Saturday with Saudi Prince Turki El Faisal, an
adviser to the Saudi royal family.
Senate reviews civil rights chief
WASHINGTON (UPI) - The White
House gave Ernest Lefever a vote of
confidence as President Reagan's top
human rights spokesman yesterday in
the face of strong opposition that
threatened to block or delay in-
definitely his Senate confirmation.
Most if not all of the committee's
eight Democrats are opposed to
Lefever because of his general view
that the United States should publicly
condemn human rights violations in
communist countries but respond with
"quiet diplomacy" to violations by non-
communist governments friendly to
Washington.
"CHAIRMAN Charles Percy (R-Ill.)
announced at the end of the day that the
committee will vote on Lefever im-
mediately after the Memorial Day
recess ending June 1. "There is no
reason to rush this matter," Percy said.
Sen. Jesse Helms (R-N.C.), a strong
Lefever supporter, and National Coun-
cil of Churches President M. William
Howard clashed during the afternoon
session.
Howard said he opposed Lefever on
behalf of the council's 42 million mem-
bers, but Helms disputed that. When
Howard said he represented the coun-
cil's 177-member governing board,
Helms told him: "Then you don't
represent 42 million Americans."
LEFEVER'S supporters also in-
cluded the American Jewish Forum,
the National Association of
Evangelicals, and Michael Novak, U.S.
delegate to the U.N. Human Rights
Commission.
The NAACP, Mayor Donald Fraser of
Minneapolis, the National Council of
Churches, the New York Lawyers
Committee for International Human
Rights and Scientists for Sakharov,
Orlov and Shcharansky were among
those arrayed against the nominee.
Butz will plead guilty
to tax evasion charge
FORT WAYNE, Ind. (UPI) - A
federal prosecutor said yesterday for-
mer Agriculture Secretary Earl Butz
has agreed to plead guilty to tax
evasion charges.
U.S. Attorney David Ready said he
had reached a plea bargaining
agreement with Butz, 71, who served in
the cabinets of Presidents Nixon and
Ford. But he refused to say how much
money was involved in the tax-evasion
case.
WHEN REACHED BY phone yester-
day, Butz declined to comment on the
case, but did observe other tax cases
"aren't spread all over the front
pages.
Ready indicated Butz will plead
guilty to a charge involving the 1978 tax
year and said all the alleged violations
occurred after Butz ended his gover-
nment service.
But the prosecutor refused to
elaborate, pending Butz' appearance
before U.S. District Judge Jesse Esch-
bach on Friday.
THE MAXIMUM sentence is five
years imprisonment and a $10,000 fine.
Ready refused to comment on
published reports that Butz failed to
report and pay taxes on thousands of
dollars earned for public speeches and
lectures.
Butz was appointed secretary of
agriculture by Nixon in 1971 and con-
tinued in the post under Ford. He
resigned in October 1976 when a racial
joke he told was made public a month
before the 1976 presidential election.
SHORTLY BEFORE word of the joke
surfaced, Butz outraged some Catholics
and Italian-Americans with a comment
chiding Pope Paul VI for his stand on
birth control.
"He no playa the game, he no maka
the rules," Butz said in a mock Italian
accent.
Butz, a former dean of Purdue
University's school of agriculture, still
is much in demand as a speaker and
has had his own syndicated radio
program.
He makes about 200 speeches a year
coast to coast for fees ranging up to
$2,500. Some of those fees he turns over
to the Dean Butz Scholarship Fund at
Purdue, which received nearly $10,000
in 1977.