Bush Reports Accord on Mideast ‘Common Principles’

Vice President George Bush, winding up a 10-day tour of the Middle East, said Tuesday that Israel, Jordan and Egypt have agreed to a U.S.-drafted statement of “common principles” on which to base future peace efforts.

He also said that Egypt and Israel are “very close” to settling a festering border dispute that has paralyzed their relations for much of the last four years and that Assistant Secretary of State Richard W. Murphy will remain in Cairo for an extra day in hopes of cinching an agreement on the Red Sea resort of Taba.

Bush, who spoke to reporters shortly before leaving for Washington, described the six-point statement of principles that he obtained from Egypt, Israel and Jordan as a “good development” that should help push the faltering peace process forward.

‘A Sense of Hope’

One of the vice president’s senior aides said this statement, the wording of which was cleared with the three countries beforehand, establishes a new framework for peace by creating “a base line and a sense of hope for people in a region where there has been a sense of stalemate.”

However, several diplomats and Egyptian officials, interviewed after Bush’s departure, were more guarded in their optimism, noting that the statement contained no specifics and no agreements that had not already existed among the three parties long before the vice president’s trip.

A senior Egyptian official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said that although Bush apparently wanted to “give an impression of American involvement” in the peace process, there was “nothing new” in his statement.

Bush conceded that the “points of agreement had existed before,” but said he thought they had not been “put together quite like this” until now.

Negotiated Peace a Must

The statement said a negotiated peace is essential, should lead to treaties recognizing the “right of all states and peoples in the region to peace and security” and must take into account both the “security needs of Israel” and the “aspirations of the Palestinian people.”

It called for resolving the Palestinian question within the context of a confederation between Jordan and the West Bank of the Jordan River on the basis of U.N. Security Council Resolutions 242 and 338, which have long been the legal framework for peace efforts in the Middle East.

Negotiations, it said, should involve talks between Israel and a joint Jordanian-Palestinian delegation on the one hand, and Israel and Syria on the other--provided that all parties are committed to peace and have openly declared their rejection of “violence and terrorism.”

A final point, added by the Bush team, reiterated Washington’s guarded endorsement of an international peace conference as demanded by Jordan, provided it leads to direct negotiations between Israel and its Arab neighbors and is “structured in a way that permits progress and not paralysis.”

Syria Called ‘Negative’

Bush said that his aides worked out the wording of these points with Israel, Jordan and Egypt but conceded that Syria, which he did not visit, has “not been very forthcoming . . . in fact has been rather negative” about the peace process.

But he added that his talks with Prime Minister Shimon Peres of Israel, King Hussein of Jordan and President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt have convinced him that “there is enough common ground for progress to be made in the peace process.”

The three leaders, he said, are “frustrated by what they see as a stalemate” and want “the U.S. to play an active role in re-energizing the peace process.” Washington, he added, is “prepared to play such a catalytic role.”

However, Bush indicated that he did not have a clear idea yet of what the next U.S. step in the peace process ought to be. He said he will talk to President Reagan and Secretary of State George P. Shultz upon his return to Washington to see “if out of this common ground . . . there’s not some way we can be useful.” But he added, “I don’t want to raise hopes. That’s not what this trip has been about.”

U.S. Indifference Seen

Moderate Arab states, especially Jordan and Egypt, have long urged Washington to become more actively involved in Mideast peace efforts and have frequently expressed frustration at what they see as the Reagan Administration’s reluctance to do so. They have argued that the consensus for peace that Bush found has existed for the past 18 months but is going nowhere because of what appears to be Washington’s indifference to the region.

After Bush’s departure, senior Egyptian diplomats, speaking privately, confessed to having mixed emotions about the outcome of the vice president’s trip. While these officials all said the visit could be important if it heralds a reawakening of American interest and leadership in the Middle East, several expressed frustration that this interest had not been awakened sooner.

Some of these officials also echoed the cynical but widely held view that Bush’s trip had less to do with U.S. interest in the peace process than with the vice president’s 1988 presidential ambitions.

Bush’s Motives Questioned

From the start, the vice president’s trip has been heavy on “photo opportunities” but embarrassingly light on substance. Noting that Bush brought no substantive American ideas or proposals with him, one senior Egyptian diplomat said, “We wasted last year and now we are wasting this year because of the (American) elections.”

A U.S. mediation team, headed by Murphy, tried to use the visit as a lever to finally conclude 15 months of negotiations between Egypt and Israel over Taba, the Red Sea resort that Israel retained when it withdrew from the rest of the Sinai in 1982.