Reagan Tells Peres of Need to Cede Land

President Reagan impressed upon visiting Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres today the urgency of pursuing peace in the Middle East and said any settlement will have to include an exchange of territory, according to his spokesman.

White House spokesman Marlin Fitzwater, in an oblique reference apparently aimed at Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir, said leaders in the region must be willing to consider new “realistic” alternatives and move with speed “if there is to be a comprehensive settlement in the region.”

“A settlement must be grounded on the realistic basis of U.N. Resolution 242 and its call for an exchange of territory for peace,” Fitzwater said.

“Those leaders who are negative, consistently reject new ideas and fail to exploit realistic opportunities to bring about negotiations make progress impossible,” he said. “They will have to answer to their own people for the suffering that will inevitably result.”

Hails Labor Leader

Reagan told Peres of the “urgent need to make progress” toward peace, Fitzwater said, while touting the head of the Labor Party as “creative and with the courage and wisdom to say yes when real opportunities arise.”

Secretary of State George P. Shultz returns to the region June 3 for a new attempt to win acceptance for his call for negotiations between Israel and a Jordanian-Palestinian delegation on the future status of the West Bank and Gaza Strip, which have been torn by violence in recent past months.

Peres supports the Shultz plan, which calls for Arab-Israeli peace talks to be held under the auspices of the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council: the United States, Soviet Union, China, England and France.

Shamir, Peres’ partner in the coalition government, has refused to accede to the international conference. Both face voters in the fall.

‘No Reason to Give Up’

Speaking with reporters at the White House, Peres said he had told Reagan that there is “no reason to give up” on efforts to get the stalled Mideast peace process going.

“I have said to the President the way I feel: that the road to peace is a complicated one but there is no reason to give up and no reason to feel that we have reached the end of it,” Peres said.

“On the contrary, I am convinced that we can negotiate the difficulties,” he added.

Peres said Reagan had told him that he intends to raise the issue at his summit meeting with Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev in Moscow, May 30-June 2, but the Israeli leader said he doubts that anything definitive will result.

“I expect it to be raised; I don’t know if it can be solved in one jump,” he said.