While Jerusalem has yet to make it official, Israel’s acceptance of U.S. proposals for a Middle East peace conference is a mere “formality,” Defense Minister Moshe Arens said on a nationally televised news program Sunday.
“I think we are very close to an agreement that would allow the initial meeting to take place and then break up into bilateral talks,” the Israeli defense chief said on ABC-TV’s “This Week With David Brinkley.”
“At this stage of the game, I consider it to be no more than a formality,” Arens said.
It was uncertain, however, if Jerusalem would make a formal announcement before President Bush and Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev begin their summit meeting in Moscow on Tuesday.
The Bush administration had expressed hope that the Israeli decision would come before the Moscow summit. Nevertheless, “there is not a deadline,” Brent Scowcroft, the president’s national security adviser, told reporters Friday.
“We are just hoping for some kind of word before the summit,” he said.
Scowcroft said the administration still has the option of having the summit partners invite Israel and the Arab countries to a conference whether or not they have agreed in advance to attend.
But he admitted that the administration would be reluctant to do so because the result would be that participants would not “come with the psychological attitude to make the conference a success.
“They come already feeling like they make concessions to get there, and that’s not the best attitude to make the conference a success.”
But Arens maintained Sunday that Israel does not “really feel we are being pushed” by the United States.
“It is now clear that after 43 years, the Syrian leader, Hafez Assad, is ready to sit down and negotiate directly with Israel,” Arens said, “I consider that to be a significant step forward.”
‘THIS UNPRECEDENTED SITUATION’
Arens also said that the United States and Israel have agreed that the Palestinian representatives in the joint Jordanian-Palestinian delegation not include any members of the Palestine Liberation Organization or residents of Jerusalem.
But the Palestinians have so far refused this condition.
Bush last Thursday called on both Israel and the Palestinians to agree to the conference despite their reservations.
He urged the Palestinians to “do everything possible to take advantage of this unprecedented situation to attain their legitimate rights, and at the same time further the cause of peace.”
Arens said the conference would be a one or two-day affair, which would be followed by “direct, bilateral negotiations” between Israel and Syria, Israel and Lebanon, and Israel and the Jordanian-Palestinian delegation.
Arens refused to repeat the position enunciated by Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir last week that Israel will never withdraw from any of the territory taken in 1967.
The Israeli government’s position has always been “we are ready to sit down and negotiate without preconditions,” Arens said.
“I think it should be everybody’s position that we should not preempt the negotiations and try to determine right now what their outcome should be.”
Arens expressed the belief that through direct negotiations, an agreement could be reached with Syria. He refused to comment on whether Israel would be ready to give up any part of the Golan Heights.
‘PEARL HARBOR-TYPE ATTACKS’
But he noted that Israel has legitimate security concerns about the Golan Heights.
The Syrians “want to forget that for many years they terrorized the Israeli settlements in the Jordan Valley, didn’t let people go to work, didn’t let children go to school,” the defense minister said.
He added that in 1967 and 1973, Syria used the Golan Heights to launch “Pearl Harbor-type attacks on Israel.”
Former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, who also appeared on the ABC program, said that Israel could withdraw from part or all of the Golan Heights “if a proper security system could be set up.”
He said this could be done by demilitarizing the Golan under United Nations supervision.
But Assad, in an interview with the Washington Post and Newsweek, said peace requires Israel to withdraw from all territories taken in 1967. “The occupied lands should be returned to their owners, be they Syrians, Palestinians or Lebanese,” Assad said.
He said that for the Arabs to agree to anything less would be capitulation.
“If Israel is not going to quit the occupied land, why then should we want peace?” he asked.
‘A RELIABLE NEGOTIATOR’
Assad said that the United States has not given Syria any assurances on the Golan Heights. “It only reaffirmed its commitment” to U.N. Security Council resolutions 242 and 338.
Kissinger said Sunday he did not expect a Syrian reconciliation with Israel.
“I don’t think that even translates into Arabic for him (Assad),” he said.
But Kissinger, who conducted long negotiations with Assad, emphasized that “if one makes an agreement with him that is based on a mutual interest and a balance of forces, then he will keep it as long as the balance of forces is maintained.
“I found him a reliable negotiator.”
Kissinger also cautioned against putting all the “onus on Israel for the success or failure of the peace process.
“They are in a very difficult position,” he explained. “They are surrounded by 100 million Arabs that have not accepted them up to now. They cannot afford a single mistake.”
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