Rabin Holds Warm Session at State in Advance of White House Meeting

In a further indication that relations between Israel and the Clinton administration are getting off to a good start, Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin held what was termed a positive meeting Friday with Secretary of State Warren Christopher.

Rabin arrived Friday morning in Washington for a visit scheduled to last over a week that will include busy rounds of meetings with U.S. officials and American Jewish groups.

During Friday’s meeting, which a State Department spokesperson termed “very good,” the officials discussed the Middle East peace process, the rise of Islamic fundamentalism and the threat posed by Iran.

Neither the State Department nor the Israeli Embassy would provide many details about the meeting, which ran for approximately three hours and included a working lunch.

The purpose of Friday’s discussions was, primarily, to prepare for Rabin’s scheduled meeting Monday with President Clinton.

National Security Adviser Anthony Lake and Edward Djerejian, the U.S. assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern and South Asian affairs, also took part in the meeting.

Rabin’s U.S. visit comes at a crucial time as Christopher works to persuade the various Middle East parties to return to the peace talks here April 20.

It is also a time when, facing pressure to reduce the federal deficit, the U.S. Congress has begun discussing the future of foreign aid, including the once sacrosanct economic and military assistance package for Israel.

HOPE FOR PROGRESS WITH SYRIA

Christopher and Rabin had already forged a good working relationship in the early weeks of the Clinton administration as they crafted a compromise deal on the 415 Palestinians whom Israel deported to Lebanon in December.

The relationship was enhanced by what most observers called successful meetings during Christopher’s recent trip to Israel and other Middle Eastern countries.

But questions still hang over both the peace process and the issue of U.S. aid to Israel.

The Clinton administration has made the peace process a high priority, agreeing to serve as a “full partner” in the talks, assuming the parties engage in serious negotiations.

It is still unclear, however, whether the Palestinians will return to the negotiating table.

Although Christopher has expressed optimism that they will come back, Palestinian leaders have said they will not return until the Palestinian deportees are allowed to return to the administered territories.

Both Israeli and American officials, on the other hand, have spoken positively about the prospects for progress in the bilateral talks between Israel and Syria.

On the issue of foreign aid, the Clinton administration has strongly endorsed maintaining aid to Israel at its current level of $3 billion annually for the 1994 fiscal year.

But at a news conference last week, Christopher would not speculate on aid levels beyond 1994, saying it was hoped that progress in the peace process and in economic reforms in Israel would lessen the need for American aid.

U.S. DEDUCTIONS EXPECTED

Israel is about to receive the first installment of U.S. guarantees for $10 billion in commercial loans it hopes to take out over the next five years.

The once-controversial guarantees will be given to Israel in installments covering up to $2 billion in loans per year, with the first billion being released Monday, according to the Israeli Embassy.

But Israel expects it will not receive guarantees for the full $2 billion this year. That is because the United States reserves the right to reduce the guarantees by the amount Israel spends in the administered territories, if that spending is considered inconsistent with terms of the loan agreement.

Israeli Finance Minister Avraham Shohat, who has been visiting Washington for meetings with U.S. officials, told Israeli reporters at a briefing here last week that he expects the United States to begin such deductions with the second installment of the guarantees.

While Israel has, for the most part, frozen the construction of homes in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, it expects to spend some money in the territories that Washington would find objectionable.

Shohat said that starting this year, Israel will keep the United States informed on its expenditures, and that the deductions would begin in late 1993.

He declined to name a specific figure by which he expected the loan guarantees to be reduced.

Rabin and Shohat met Friday with Robert Rubin, a Clinton economic adviser, who gave them a briefing on the administration’s economic plan and the economic situation in the United States, the Israeli Embassy said.