Israeli government circles and Jordan’s Foreign Minister Salah Abu Zeid have rejected reports that King Hussein expressed willingness to make a separate peace with Israel during his meetings last week in Washington with President Nixon and top U.S. officials. Israel Galili, a Minister-Without-Portfolio who is a confidant of Premier Golda Meir and often reflects the government’s views, said on a television interview Friday night that Jordan has made no move toward a separate peace agreement.
His remarks were corroborated by Abu Zeid who accompanied Hussein to Washington, In a tv interview Friday broadcast via sattelite to Amman, he said Hussein made no gesture toward a separate peace. Abu Zeid said Jordan would hold no direct negotiations with Israel nor would it agree to partial solutions of the Middle East conflict. His remarks. were apparently intended to refute U.S, press reports that claimed Hussein was ready for a separate peace with Israel.
One report from Washington Friday said the Hashemite monarch told members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee with whom he breakfasted Thursday that he was ready to enter into separate negotiations with Israel without waiting for Egypt to take a similar step.
Senators who attended the breakfast reportedly said that in addition to disclosing his willingness to negotiate, Hussein said he was “reasonably optimistic.” The King’s position on a separate peace was described in the press report as a departure from the stand he took before leaving for Washington a week ago.
PEACE WITHOUT PRE-CONDITIONS
Galili said, however, that he accepted Hussein’s statement before his departure that a separate peace would be a stab in the back for the rest of the Arab world, Galili said Israel was ready to make a separate peace with any Arab state, especially with Jordan. However, he added, “It appears that Hussein is not satisfied with what he hears from us, with our very simple offer, that we are ready for peace talks with him without any pre-conditions….He himself insists on pre-conditions, particularly-on the territorial question,” Galili said.
Israelis, meanwhile, appeared uncertain of what their own government’s position is at this juncture. The newspaper, Haaretz, reported today that Deputy Premier bigal Allon said at a closed meeting of government leaders recently that he would be prepared to negotiate extra-territorial rights with respect to Moslem holy places in Jerusalem provided that all problems pertaining to East Jerusalem and the West Bank were settled first between Jordan and Israel in direct negotiations.
But Amnon Dunckner, a spokesman for Allon, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency today that the Haaretz report was completely without foundation. Dunckner said “Mr. Allon never did and never will consent to an extra-territorial status for Jordan in any part of Jerusalem.”
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