Insisting that the American peace package presented to him by Secretary of State George Shultz last week is neither sacrosanct nor unalterable, Premier Yitzhak Shamir made clear Sunday night that the government will make no decisions until he returns from Washington later this month with necessary changes.
Shamir spoke at a meeting of the National Religious Party after refusing, at Sunday’s Cabinet meeting, to allow the Shultz plan to be voted on.
He was referring to the letter Shultz presented to him and to Foreign Minister Shimon Peres last Friday outlining in detail a greatly accelerated timetable for Arab-Israeli peace negotiations, to be preceded as early as next month by the opening of an international peace conference, under United Nations auspices.
“I am to leave next week to visit the U.S. We will conduct talks on the matter. I will attempt to attain changes which will better suit our interests, and after I return, the government will convene and will decide,” Shamir said.
The prime minister is due to arrive in Washington March 14 and to meet with President Reagan at the White House March 16.
Although Shultz had requested that Israel provide a “clear response” to the plan by March 15 and stressed that the package must be treated as a whole, with all of its components, Shamir seemed to disagree.
“The contents of this (Shultz’s) letter are not something which cannot be altered. Changes can be made through talks, discussions, persuasions. things can be changed,” the leader of the Likud bloc said.
“This is not some kind of ultimatum, a demand to follow a certain course — that’s it, you have to say yes or no,” Shamir added. “Even the timetable determined by the American administration is, ultimately, neither sacred or untouchable. After all, Israel is a sovereign state.
“Therefore, I don’t think we are obligated to hasten to provide a reply,” he said. “It may endanger to a great extent what we have achieved, what we wish to accomplish and the progress we wish to — and must — attain.”
The prime minister stressed that he does “not believe that we will be able to reach any type of serious negotiations capable of producing results” until the unrest in the administered territories has been ended.
“This, I repeat, is the most important mission facing us at the moment. Our American friends also understand this,” he said.
Meanwhile, Peres, whose Labor Party is deadlocked with Shamir’s Likud over the American package, warned of dire consequences should Israel reject it.
He told a Labor Party regional conference that Israel would find itself in a difficult economic situation if the Americans are given a negative response.
“We will not find any country or statesman who will support Israel. The European Community will find it difficult to accept Israeli produce, and all efforts to break into the large economic market of Asia will be blocked,” the foreign minister warned.
“In the U.S., we will permanently lose friends and assets, and criticism among the Jewish people will increase,” Peres said.
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.
