The three-day Arab summit meeting in Amman ended Wednesday in a clear-cut political victory for its host, King Hussein of Jordan.
The Hashemite monarch, who has never been accused of audacity in expressing moderate views among his peers, this time placed on the table his plans for an international peace conference as an instrumentality for negotiations with Israel.
And he won endorsement for it, even the grudging approval of President Hafez Assad of Syria, long a bitter foe of any approach to peace with Israel and until recently one of Hussein’s severest critics.
The king was able to claim at the end of the summit that it had brought to the Arabs unity of “word, stand and goal.” Indeed, the participants exhibited a skill rare in inter-Arab diplomacy of burying, or at least white-washing, their traditional differences. Even such arch-enemies as Assad and President Saddam Hussein of Iraq exchanged smiles.
Observers may have wondered beforehand why Hussein, ruler of a desert kingdom with serious economic difficulties, took the risk of holding a summit that may well have been a dismal failure, and of raising such delicate issues as an international peace conference. Had the gambit failed, his ability for diplomatic maneuvering would have been greatly restricted.
The answer apparently lies in the timing. The participants at the summit — not all Arab countries attended — were clearly far more concerned with the immediate dangers posed by Iran in its eight-year war with Iraq, than with their conflict with Israel, which has been simmering for 40 years.
HUSSEIN’S STANCE ENDORSED
The summit endorsed Hussein’s basic line of policy — total backing of Iraq in the Persian Gulf war. The move represents a sharp reversal of position by Assad who, with Col. Moammar Gadhafi of Libya, is the only Arab leader to have supported the regime of the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. Assad dutifully assented in the condemnation of Iran.
In that context, the international peace conference was a far less urgent matter. The Israel government remains sharply divided on the issue. Moreover, Hussein was forced to agree that the Palestine Liberation Organization must participate, which makes the prospects of a conference even more remote. But there was no mention of a Palestinian state in any of the resolutions adopted at the summit, a score in Hussein’s favor.
Nevertheless, a Damascus radio commentary Thursday said the summit conference did not obscure, at least for Syria, “the real problem of the Arab world — facing the Israeli enemy.”
On the other hand, the success of the summit, from Israel’s point of view, was underlined by the fact that it was condemned by only two countries — Iran and Libya — and that it resulted in a significant rehabilitation of Egypt in the Arab world, without in the least compromising Israeli-Egyptian diplomatic relations.
EGYPT HAS REASON TO BE PLEASED
Egypt did not attend the Amman summit, but had good reason to be satisfied with its outcome. Officially, Egypt has been boycotted by the Arab League since it signed its peace treaty with Israel in March 1979. But at the summit this week, each Arab country was given permission to renew ties with Cairo in the name of “recruiting all resources to accomplish the ends of the Arab people.”
Cairo radio welcomed on Thursday those Arab countries which “returned to Egypt.” So far, the only one is the small Gulf state of Abu Dhabi, which renewed diplomatic relations with Egypt immediately after the summit.
But its foreign minister, Rashed Abdallah, said in Cairo Thursday that other Gulf states would soon follow suit. He said his country’s decision was taken after consultations with Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar and Bahrain.
In Israel Thursday, Foreign Minister Shimon Peres said Hussein came out of the summit strengthened since the other Arab countries did not slam the peace door in his face. Premier Yitzhak Shamir was concerned however over summit resolutions that called for joint action against Israel.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
