Shultz to Confer With Two Palestinian Leaders Today

Secretary of State George P. Shultz is to discuss the escalating Arab-Israeli confrontation in the occupied territories today with two Palestinian leaders, the State Department announced Tuesday.

One of the two is an East Jerusalem newspaper publisher arrested earlier this month for urging a nonviolent boycott of Israeli cigarettes and other products.

Department spokesman Charles Redman said the two men--Hanna Siniora, publisher of the Arabic-language newspaper Al Fajr, and Fayez abu Rahme, an attorney--are “Palestinians with whom one can talk about the situation in the occupied territories.”

Shultz is also scheduled to confer today with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, who arrived in Washington late Tuesday afternoon on an official state visit.

Stops in Bonn, London

Earlier in the day, in London, Mubarak and British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher issued a joint call for an international conference to rejuvenate the Arab-Israeli peace process. Mubarak stopped in London as well as in Bonn on his way to Washington.

Siniora and Abu Rahme were among a group of Palestinian leaders who refused to meet Shultz last October in Jerusalem, a snub the secretary of state angrily blamed on intimidation by “enemies of peace” in the Palestine Liberation Organization. At the time, Palestinian sources said that if Shultz wanted to talk about conditions on the West Bank and in the Gaza Strip, “he should talk to the PLO.”

After more than six weeks of often violent disturbances in the predominantly Arab territories, which Israel captured in the Arab-Israeli War of 1967, Palestinian leaders apparently are less concerned about protocol. Although neither Siniora nor Abu Rahme is a member of the PLO, both men frequently represent PLO views.

The Reagan Administration has been embarrassed by Israel’s failure to heed U.S. calls for restraint by Israeli troops in dealing with disturbances in the occupied territories. The Administration last week called on Israel to put a stop to the often-brutal beatings of Arab demonstrators by Israeli troops.

A State Department official said Tuesday that the Israeli government has assured Washington that official guidelines do not permit the intentional breaking of bones as punishment, although troops are permitted to use clubs and batons to break up riots. “Everything we are hearing is (that) the leadership is trying to make sure that the ground rules are kept,” the official said.

Israeli Defense Minister Yitzhak Rabin has insisted that the policy of beating demonstrators will continue. The U.S. official said only that “sometimes he (Rabin) speaks in ways that are not very diplomatic.”

Seconding His Call

At a White House briefing, U.S. officials seconded President Mubarak’s call last week for a six-month cooling-off period in the West Bank and Gaza confrontations, although they conceded the prospects for such a truce are not good.

Under the plan, Palestinians would halt the current unrest for at least half a year, and Israel would impose a moratorium on new settlements in the occupied territories and agree to take part in an international conference. Jerusalem has strongly resisted such a proposal.

Thatcher also supports such a conference, which would most likely include not only Mideast countries but also the United States and the Soviet Union. Her statement with Mubarak on Tuesday was seen as an attempt to build momentum for the idea in advance of his talks with President Reagan.

In a brief stopover Monday in Bonn, Mubarak also won the support of West German Chancellor Helmut Kohl for an international peace conference.

The visible support of both Thatcher and Kohl on the issue reflects broad European sentiment in favor of such a conference.

Kempster reported from Washington and Marshall from London.