The Arab world appeared today to take an almost perverse satisfaction in the failure of the Israeli elections to give a clear-cut victory to either Labor or Likud.
A survey of the Arabic press and reports by the French media from Arab capitals indicated a degree of relief that the Labor Party, widely assumed to be more amenable to compromise than its rival, was not given a mandate to form the next government.
This attitude was especially strong in Syria where the French press quoted officials as saying that the election of Labor Party leader Shimon Peres to be Prime Minister probably would have given new impetus to the Reagan “peace plan” of September 1, 1982 which excluded Syria. It would have resulted, these sources said, in a new American attempt to push Israel and Jordan into negotiations from which Syria would be excluded.
GOOD NEWS TO DAMASCUS
French news reports from Damascus said the Syrians also believe that Labor’s “defeat” will keep Palestine Liberation Organization chief Yasir Arafat from reaching agreement with King Hussein of Jordan for joint negotiations with Israel. The Likud government’s pre-election pledge not to return an inch of territory will prevent the PLO and Jordan from adopting any joint stand on the West Bank, Syrian sources said.
This apparently is all to the good from Damascus’ point of view. The Syrian news agency stressed today that “no solution to the Middle East crisis can be found without active Syrian participation.”
The closest thing to an official Syrian reaction to the Israeli elections came from Foreign Minister Faruk Al Shareh who said the results “reflect the Israeli moral crisis, itself a result of the bellicose policy pursued by the (Likud) government in Lebanon and elsewhere.”
The French News Agency, Agence France Presse, said that Jordan is relieved by Labor’s failure because the election of Peres would have meant a new Israeli initiative based on “the Jordanian option.” Amman considers this “a dangerous trap,” according to the AFP. But the Jordanians fear nevertheless that continuation of a Likud administration would mean even more intensive Israeli colonization of the West Bank.
In Lebanon, government sources declined official comment on the election results because “Israel is too near and too powerful for us to speak out on any Israeli internal issue.” But officials in Beirut were quoted as warning the Lebanese media not to believe that a Labor-led Israeli government would be an easier negotiating partner than the Likud-led regime.
These attitudes contrasted sharply with the disappointment openly expressed by Palestinian leaders on the West Bank that Labor failed to win the election. (See separate story, P.I.)
CAUTION IN CAIRO
In Cairo, Egyptian Foreign Minister Esmat Abdel Meguid called on Israel’s next government “to take immediate steps to end the occupation of Lebanon and other Arab territories and to start negotiations for a just solution to the Palestinian problem in all its aspects.”
Egyptian officials refused to say publicly whether they preferred a Labor or Likud government. Privately, they professed not to care one way or the other. “It is all the same to us,” one official was quoted as saying.
The Cairo daily Al Ghomurya said that the “only winner in (the Israeli) elections is Israeli intransigence.” The daily Al Ahram predicted that “nothing will move (in the Middle East) until after the American Presidential elections.”
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
