The Democratic Movement for Change (DMC) endorsed Premier Menachem Begin’s peace plan last night as the best basis for negotiations with Egypt and other Arab countries and urged that the talks be conducted directly with no intermediaries.
A resolution to that effect was adopted at a meeting of the party’s governing council in Tel Aviv with only two abstentions and no dissent. The council acted after Deputy Premier Yigael Yadin, the DMC leader, strongly implied that U.S. mediation efforts were misleading Israel as to Egypt’s true intentions.
“As long as there are direct talks, there is a chance” for a settlement, Yadin declared. “We insist on it because we are faced with an intolerable situation in which we hear from the mediators what the Egyptians thought when the Egyptians themselves perhaps do not know it,” he said. Israel has reached the conclusion, therefore, that it is no longer tolerable to conduct negotiations with Egypt through a mediator “however good his intentions may be.”
Yadin did not mention the U.S. but was obviously referring to the efforts of Assistant Secretary of State Alfred L. Atherton, designated as President Carter’s Ambassador-at-Large in the Middle East. Atherton’s shuttle diplomacy between Jerusalem, Cairo and Amman ended prior to Begin’s visit to Washington last month without ending the stalemate in Israeli-Egyptian talks or inducing Jordan to participate in them.
SEES PROGRESS IN NEGOTIATING PROCESS
Yadin said that Defense Minister Ezer Weizman’s visit to Cairo last week represented progress in the negotiating process. “Cairo hosted Israel’s Defense Minister and her Attorney General (Aharon Barak, who accompanied Weizman) not to talk about the weather,” he said.
“This was not the last meeting. This means there is hope, there is still room for further efforts. One should do a great deal of thinking, one must be sophisticated because presently we do not deal with sublime matters but with very concrete issues,” Yadin said. He added that “One should remember that the present negotiations are critical, delicate and fateful.” Transport Minister Meir Amit proposed that Israel should concentrate on the demilitarization of Sinai and that any settlement on the West Bank should guarantee Israel’s security needs.
The resolution adopted at the close of the meeting supported Begin’s peace plan, rejected Egypt’s insistence on “pre-conditions” for continuing negotiations and stressed that a durable settlement in the region can be achieved only if both parties agreed that everything is negotiable. The resolution reiterated the DMC’s opposition to the creation of a Palestinian state.
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