Jordan Favors U.S. Mideast Plan, Shultz Says

Secretary of State George P. Shultz said Saturday that Jordan’s King Hussein is generally in favor of the American Middle East peace initiative but is unwilling to commit himself to it publicly unless Israel agrees to bargain territory for peace.

Talking to reporters after a 2 1/2-hour meeting with Hussein, Shultz said the Hashemite monarch made it clear that he believes negotiations would be a waste of time without Israel’s assurance that it will talk about relinquishing at least part of the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip.

“Jordan hesitates to say, ‘Yes, we’ll go into a negotiation,’ until they have some assurance that it is going to be based on the (U.N. Security Council resolution) 242 formula of territory for peace,” Shultz said. “If they feel that there is no territorial compromise possible, then they feel, ‘What am I going to negotiate about?’ And since the fact of saying yes is a major thing, they are always interested to know the news from the other side of the river (Israel).”

Shultz’s comments seemed to be designed to increase the pressure on Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir to accept the U.S. initiative, which calls for an international conference to set the stage for direct negotiations between Israel and its Arab adversaries. The talks would be based on the U.N. Security Council resolution calling for Israeli withdrawal from occupied territory in exchange for Arab recognition of Israel’s right to live in peace within internationally recognized borders.

Shultz, making his fourth trip to the region this year in his so-far fruitless effort to bring the parties to the bargaining table, visits Jerusalem today for talks with Shamir, Foreign Minister Shimon Peres and Defense Minister Yitzhak Rabin.

He is scheduled to confer with Syrian officials in Damascus on Monday before leaving the area Tuesday to attend a North Atlantic Treaty Organization foreign ministers’ meeting in Madrid.

Shamir, leader of the right-wing Likud Bloc in Israel’s coalition government, has objected strongly to most of the provisions of the Shultz plan but has not rejected it outright. Israeli officials have said that Shamir hopes to stall until the Arab side turns down the proposal, thus saving Israel from the responsibility for killing a major policy initiative by its closest ally.

Shamir and his American supporters have said frequently that there is no Arab partner ready to negotiate with Israel.

But Shultz said the Jordanians “as a general proposition . . . are in favor of proceeding.” But he said Hussein insisted that the Israeli government is not ready to move ahead.

Peres, leader of the centrist Labor Alignment, generally supports the Shultz plan. But if Shamir continues to drag his feet, there is no possibility that the Israeli government will move on the proposal until after the next election, expected to be held Nov. 1, in which the peace process is sure to be a major issue.

Shultz began his current round of intensive diplomacy earlier this year in response to the bloody Palestinian uprising in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

However, talking to a group of leading Egyptian newspaper editors and columnists in Cairo before his departure for Amman on Saturday, Shultz appeared to write off the uprising as a force for change.

Shultz said the only way to secure Palestinian rights is through Arab-Israeli negotiations.

“Terrorism hasn’t worked; violence hasn’t worked; and the uprising . . . in the end, has not produced a result,” Shultz said. “It has dramatized people’s concerns and has called a lot of attention to those concerns, but it hasn’t produced any result. You are only going to get a result if you can find your way into a negotiation.”

Shultz said the negotiations must include Palestinian representatives, but he said that Washington continues to oppose an independent Palestinian delegation. The U.S. plan calls for Palestinians to be included in a joint delegation with Jordan.

Shultz said that Hussein agrees with the joint delegation concept despite public statements by Jordanian officials that the Palestinians are entitled to try to win a separate place at the table.