The View from Jerusalem: Optimism Wanes As Vance Proceeds on His Mideast Tour

The mood of optimism which enveloped U.S. Secretary of State Cyrus Vance’s current Mideast tour in its early stages appeared to be waning over the weekend as Vance journeyed from Jordan to Saudi Arabia, his penultimate stop. He is expected in Israel on Tuesday and will stay here for two days before making one more lightning round of the Arab capitals en route for home.

Before the tour began all talk was centered on the hope for reconvening of the Geneva conference in October. Everyone knew that the problem of Palestinian participation remained to be surmounted, but somehow, encouraged by positive statements from President Carter, Premier Menachem Begin and President Anwar Sadat of Egypt, observers allowed their optimism to sway their predictions.

After Vance’s Cairo talks the focus seemed to shift to a slightly less apocalyptic goal: a “working group” of Mideast foreign ministers to be held in New York simultaneously with the United Nations General Assembly. Israeli officials, taking their cue from Begin himself, were quick to voice their welcome of this idea — though they cautioned that it would be meaningless if Syria did not approve it too.

As it quickly turned out, the caution was wiser than the welcome. Syria rejected what it saw as an attempt to circumvent the issue of Palestinian participation. Egypt, sensing the way the wind was blowing, let it be known that what it in fact had in mind was not face-to-face talks at a round table, but “proximity talks” with Vance shuttling between the delegations’ hotel suites. Jordan apparently echoed the Syrian line, and Vance himself forced to concede that the most that could be hoped for was indeed some kind of proximity talks in New York.

READY FOR PROXIMITY TALKS AS ALTERNATIVE

Israeli officials over the weekend were at pains to stress their readiness to participate in this sort of dialogue, too — in line with the Begin government’s general policy of emphasizing Israel’s readiness to talk anywhere, anyhow, without preconditions — with all or any of the original December 1973 Geneva participants.

Clearly, the Vance mission was in trouble, though. Israeli officials were careful not to say any thing that might contribute to the atmosphere of letdown, especially before Vance arrived in Jerusalem. There was also the hope that his personal report to Begin and Foreign Minister Moshe Dayan might yet be more promising than the media reports of his talks in the Arab capitals seemed to fore shadow.

But as for as one could judge from those media reports, there had been no marked progress on either procedural or substantive issues and the New York talks — whatever their ultimate form — seemed to be intended as a formula for sustaining momentum in the absence of really meaningful progress.

As such, of course, it was useful to both the Americans, who have invested much prestige in the effort to advance Mideast peacemaking, and to the Mideast protagonists themselves — on the assumption that they all want to avoid a deterioration that could bring a new war.

ANOTHER ROUND OF PRE-TALKS TALKS

Thus it seemed, before Vance’s arrival here, that the most his tour would achieve was the hope of yet another round of pre-talks talks, this time in New York, with all those involved standing by in the hope that a more significant breakthrough could be developed in New York.

While the political policy-makers here maintained, at least outwardly, the attitude of ultimate optimism regarding Geneva that they developed during the Begin visit to the U.S., other “circles in Tel Aviv” have been airing pointedly less rosy prognoses. These “circles,” in meetings with newsmen, have been saying candidly that the chances of Geneva reconvening do not look good, and therefore the chances of renewed hostilities must be taken most seriously.

There was no immediate explanation as to why these two widely differing outlooks had been allowed to be publicized. But some observers surmised that the Tel Aviv “circles” wished to impress the public that they were ready for the worst.