Premier Menachem Begin told the Knesset today “We have left the door definitely open for further negotiations” with Egypt. He said that Israel was ready for a renewal of the political and military talks, suspended last Wednesday when President Anwar Sadat recalled his negotiators from Jerusalem, and to continue negotiations for a joint declaration of principles or on “bilateral issues.”
But Begin said this could occur only if the atmosphere “improves” and there are “no more insults against the honor of the Jewish people which we are here to protect and defend.”
Begin’s address to the Knesset was conciliatory in tone and generally free of polemics. But he called Sadat’s suspension of the political talks “unjustified,” especially as an agreement on a declaration of principles was almost concluded. He accused the Egyptians of reneging on the extent of the demilitarized zone in Sinai which, he said, he and Sadat had agreed to at their private talks in Jerusalem in November. He denied press reports that he had apologized to Egyptian Foreign Minister Mohammed Ibrahim Kaamel for delivering a political speech at a social dinner here last week.
Begin also said he was “shocked” by Sadat’s remarks published in the Egyptian magazine October after the Jerusalem talks were broken off. And he lashed out repeatedly against what he called “a most virulent campaign of vilification against Israel and its government” launched by the Egyptian press.
He devoted a large part of his speech to reciting quotations from several Egyptian newspapers which he called “a repetition of what we used to read in ‘Der Sturmer,’ “the Nazi organ of the Hitler regime.
However, the Premier added, “If we see in the days ahead that there are no more such attacks there will be no obstacle to (Defense Minister Ezer) Weizman’s going to Cairo” to resume the military committee talks. The return of the Israeli military team to Cairo was postponed by a decision of the Cabinet yesterday.
SPEECH IS CONCILIATORY
It was clear to observers that Begin’s prepared text had undergone some last minute softening, possibly at the insistence of some of his more moderate coalition ministers. And the speech he delivered was, in some instances, even softer than the prepared text given to newsmen in advance.
But Begin spoke bluntly, nevertheless. He rejected out of hand, Sadat’s demand in the Egyptian Parliament Saturday for total Israeli withdrawal from the occupied territories and his warning that Egypt would not tolerate Israeli settlements in Sinai after a peace settlement was reached.
Begin said he had made Israel’s position on the settlements clear to Sadat on various occasions, including Israel’s insistence that the settlements continue to be administered and defended by Israel after Sinai is returned to Egyptian sovereignty. He noted that the Ismailia summit talks had not broken up over that issue but rather that he and Sadat had exchanged their differing views in a “most civilized and cordial” manner.
He insisted that when he and Sadat met privately in Jerusalem the Egyptian leader had pledged the total demilitarization of Sinai beyond the Gidi and Mitle passes. “We based our peace plan on that,” Begin told the Knesset. “The passes are 180-200 kilometers away from the international boundaries. However, Gen. (Mohammed) Gamassy (the Egyptian War Minister) proposed to Weizman a different line from which the demilitarization would begin–a line only 40 kilometers from the border. The disparity therefore is 140-160 kilometers. That disparity is for us a world of difference. Sinai was the base of aggression five times in 30 years. This can never be again.”
Begin added: “We shall stand firm on the crucial principle of total demilitarization of the Sinai from the passes to the border. This was President Sadat’s clear pledge to me. There must be credibility in negotiations between us. Let not the Egyptian General Staff deny this pledge. I call upon him to instruct his General Staff to abide by his undertakings.”
TAKES ISSUE WITH SADAT’S SPEECH
Begin took sharp issue with Sadat’s speech to his Parliament Saturday. He denied Sadat’s charge that Israel said negotiations would take five years and rebuked him for saying that Zionism had “taken over alien land in Palestine.” Denying that he made any apology to Kaamel, Begin said no apology was called for. He claimed that political speeches were accepted practice on such occasions and that it had been his “national duty to react to Kaamel’s demand for full withdrawal and the return of Jerusalem.”
Begin reserved his bitterest invectives for the Egyptian press. He quoted the Egyptian journalist Aniss Mansour, writing in the semi-official Al Ahram on Jan. 3: “Drinking coffee together (with Israelis) proves nothing. One can also have coffee in a zoo….Sitting with Jews is to sit with the world’s speculators of every generation….Bargaining, trickery and calculations of profit and loss are part of their character and they are incapable of changing. The dream of Zionism is a philosophy of Nazi Hitlerism.”
He quoted Mustafa Amin, in Akhbar el Yom, Cairo’s largest daily, after the Ismailia summit: “Begin should thank God he was not beaten up by members of the Egyptian delegation in Ismailia….The meeting was not with representatives of the State of Israel but with Shylock the arms merchant (sic) in the well-known story by Shakespeare.”
Begin said he was particularly angered by the remark attributed to Sadat in October magazine that “Israel is like a man who says to another: ‘I would like you to sleep so I can murder you.'”
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