Israel Frees Key Arafat Supporter : Arab Leader Seen as Possible Link for PLO Dialogue

Faisal Husseini, one of a rare species of identifiable Arab leaders inside Israel, left an Israeli prison where he was held without trial and returned home Sunday to hugs, kisses and indications he may be a link for talks between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization.

Husseini is considered to be a top local political operative of PLO chief Yasser Arafat’s mainstream Fatah faction. No sooner did he arrive at his Jerusalem house than he flatly rejected a recent step-by-step peace proposal put forward by Israeli Defense Minister Yitzhak Rabin.

But despite the rejection, the very fact that Husseini responded to the Rabin offer, coupled with the fact that Rabin had sent an Israeli official to visit him in jail, set off speculation--and complaints--that Israel intended to use him to explore positions with the PLO. The government of Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir has pledged never to talk to the organization.

‘A Serious Mistake’

“It was a very serious mistake to hold a meeting with a known supporter of Yasser Arafat,” said Deputy Prime Minister David Levy, a member of Shamir’s rightist Likud Party. “Anyone who is tied to the PLO in one way or another--we should not talk to them.”

Rabin, who belongs to the left-of-center Labor Party, appears to be embarked on a solo search for a way to talk Arabs out of the continuing Palestinian rebellion in the Israeli-occupied territories. Shmuel Goren, Rabin’s coordinator of policy in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, held a meeting with Husseini last week.

The Labor Party is a junior partner in government and has long sought to negotiate a settlement of the Palestinian conflict. Shamir has resisted.

Finance Minister Shimon Peres, the Labor Party leader, defended Rabin’s actions: “I think the greatest problem ahead of us is the continuation of violence. We want to start a serious dialogue. We have to bring tranquillity to the territories,” he said.

Husseini declined to discuss his contacts with Goren and urged Israel to speak with top PLO leaders. As to whether he could serve as a bridge for such talks, Husseini responded, “The leadership will decide who will talk and when.

“I can say that at last the Israelis are starting to talk about the Palestinian problem as a political problem, not a security problem,” he said.

Rabin’s peace plan included a call for elections among Palestinians to choose a team of negotiators to talk peace.

Husseini countered the proposal with ideas identical to those put forward by the PLO: elections under United Nations supervision, presupposing an Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank and Gaza Strip and talks aimed at the creation of a Palestinian state.

Rabin’s proposal was “a very limited offer which can not possibly meet our conditions,” Husseini said. He also dismissed Rabin’s call for the Arab uprising to stop at least three months before elections are held.

‘We Are Not Children’

“Rabin reminds me of my mother,” he remarked. “I used to ask her for something and she would say, ‘Be quiet for a while and we will talk.’ But we are not children.”

At his home, sitting amid a stream of visitors and the aroma of Turkish coffee, Husseini echoed PLO stands on two points of possible negotiation.

First, talks would have to encompass the fate of Palestinians who left their homes during the various Arab-Israeli wars and are living in foreign countries and refugee camps. “We are not living in a hotel where we have a problem with the owner. We are talking about a homeland, our homeland for our people here and abroad,” he said.

Secondly, any form of political autonomy for Palestinians as proposed by the Israeli government would have to be made clearly as a step to independence and not merely a way station on the path to future talks on sovereignty.

“No interim steps,” he declared.

Call for Prisoners’ Release

Husseini, 48, suggested that if Israel wants to create a climate for peace talks, it should release Palestinian prisoners held in jail--reported to number more than 5,000--and stop its soldiers from raiding towns and villages to break up demonstrations.

“Israel has put itself atop a very high tree, and up there it is uncomfortable and cold. We were there and have come down. We have found our ladder, which is the intifada (uprising) and the declaration of a Palestinian state,” he said with some emotion. “Israel needs to find its own ladder.”

Husseini has spent 18 of the last 21 months in prison as a result of Israeli rules that permit repeated six-month detentions without trial. He was put in jail last summer after addressing a peace group in Israel and calling for the establishment of an independent Palestinian state. On Sunday, he said he was treated according to rules of “administrative detention” and mentioned no mistreatment.

No Deal Was Made

Hussein said he made no deal to win freedom from “administrative detention.” Rabin had portrayed his release as a good-will gesture, although Husseini’s latest six-month sentence was up anyway.

Asked whether he thought Rabin would summon him to discuss election plans, Husseini responded: “He has not asked me yet. If he asks me, I will answer.”

Besides belonging to the PLO, Husseini has other credentials that give him stature among Palestinians here: He is the son of Arab guerrilla leader Abdel-Kader Husseini, a member of an old and prominent Jerusalem family, who was killed fighting Israelis near Jerusalem in 1948. Before his jailing, Husseini ran the Arab Studies Center in Jerusalem, which Israeli officials closed after charging that it was a hotbed of unrest.

In addition, Husseini is not a full citizen of Israel even though he lives in Jerusalem. Unlike Arabs who live elsewhere in Israel and hold citizenship, Arabs who reside in those parts of Jerusalem annexed by Israel after the 1967 Six-Day War have only limited political rights, including the right to vote in municipal elections.