Iraq, 4 Allies Urge Mideast Nuclear, Chemical Arms Ban : Weapons: They call on Western governments to pressure Israel to comply.

Iraq and four other Arab nations called Thursday for a ban on nuclear and chemical weapons in the volatile Middle East, urging Western pressure on Israel to comply.

The proposal, coming three days after Iraqi President Saddam Hussein’s threat to retaliate with nerve gas against any Israeli attack, appeared designed to paint Israel into a diplomatic corner. It was made by the foreign ministers of Iraq, Egypt, Jordan and Yemen, meeting in Amman, Jordan. It was seconded by the Syrian foreign minister in an Israeli newspaper interview.

In public, Israel officials were skeptical of the proposal, but regional arms reduction has become a topic of serious discussion in the Foreign and Defense ministries, government sources said.

Iraq and its three allies in the Arab Cooperation Council, concluding a two-day meeting in the Jordanian capital, declared that any Mideast disarmament “should be balanced.”

“All kinds of destructive weapons, including nuclear, chemical and biological, should be prohibited in order to guarantee regional and international security,” the foreign ministers said.

Israel is the only Middle Eastern nation reputed to have nuclear arms, a strategic trump card in any regional conflict. Although the government refuses to confirm its nuclear capability, Israeli leaders responded ominously to Hussein’s threat. Former Defense Minister Yitzhak Rabin said Israel could respond “many times over” to an Iraqi chemical assault.

Responding to Thursday’s Arab proposal, Yosef Olmert, a government spokesman, remarked, “Let those who have used chemical weapons ban them first,” referring to Iraq’s wartime attacks on Iranian troops and indigenous Kurdish rebels. In general, Western governments accept nuclear deterrence as legitimate, but not chemical-warfare forces.

In wording similar to the Arab communique, Foreign Minister Farouk Shareh of Syria, a stubborn foe of both Iraq and Israel, told a reporter for the Israeli daily Hadashot based in Paris: “If there was a sincere desire for peace and security, then Israel should agree to declare the Middle East an area clear of all destructive weaponry.”

If that phrase means elimination of strategic forces, including nuclear weapons, Israel would remain heavily outmanned by Arab forces, despite its 1979 peace treaty with Egypt. And despite the vaunted Israeli edge in battlefield technology, discipline and training, the Arab countries continue to build up their conventional forces. Iraq’s army, in particular, is battle-tested and equipped with first-class imported and adapted weapons.

Nonetheless, independent Israeli analysts view the Arab offer on arms reduction as something new. Previously, Arab states had basically lobbied to get Israel to sign the 1968 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. Now, they have linked nuclear arms control with the proven Arab capacity to deliver chemical weapons.

Despite the conventional-forces advantage enjoyed by the Arabs, Israel might find a way to respond to arms control offers, defense analyst Gerald Steinberg said. “Israel could link nuclear arms control with reductions in conventional forces,” said Steinberg, a researcher at Bar Ilan University.

Steinberg pointed out that the United States and the Soviet Union have agreed to this formula in talks about arms reduction in Europe. “Israel bases its nuclear program on the presence of large Arab armies. To give it up, Israel would have to be assured that it is not falling into a conventional arms trap,” he said.

In the past, Israel has declined to link chemical and nuclear arms in a single package. It also would prefer a regional pact on nuclear arms that would permit each country to inspect each other’s atomic facilities. “Just having inspectors from hostile countries in each other’s back yard would greatly reduce tensions,” said analyst Dore Gold from the Jaffee Center for Strategic Studies in Tel Aviv.

Saddam Hussein’s tough speech Monday in Baghdad was condemned by the United States and other Western powers--State Department spokeswoman Margaret Tutwiler branded it “inflammatory, irresponsible and outrageous”--but it has rallied Arab opinion.

On Thursday, the Arab League, meeting in Tunis, Tunisia, issued a statement warning Israel that any attack on Iraq would be considered an attack on all 22 league members, Reuters news service reported. Iraq had requested the meeting to rally support in its disputes with Britain, Israel and the United States.

The Iraqi president’s words have filled the Arab world with “will, power and vigor,” declared the Jordanian newspaper Al Rai. Jordan’s King Hussein, quoted by the national Petra news agency, said Hussein “did not threaten anybody but affirmed Iraq’s ability to face any planned aggression and its legitimate right to defend itself.”

The Cairo reporter for the London-based Mideast Mirror wrote: “Saddam’s tough remarks created a feeling of excitement, even exhilaration, among the public, monopolizing conversations in sidewalk cafes.”

Hussein was stung by Western criticism of his government’s execution last month of a British-based reporter on spying charges and by the arrest in London last week of Iraqi citizens in an alleged plot to smuggle U.S.-made nuclear-weapons devices to Baghdad.

In response, he suggested that Israel and its Western allies were creating an atmosphere that invited Israeli attack on Iraqi military facilities.

“Let them drop such attempts to give Israel a pretext to strike. . . ,” he warned. “I swear to God we will let our fire eat half of Israel if it tries anything against Iraq.”

Hussein’s threats and complaints struck a sensitive chord among the Arabs, whose pride has been hurt time and again by Israel’s ability to strike targets far from its borders without fear of vengeance by strategic weapons. By brandishing chemical weapons, Hussein has attempted to introduce a balance of fear in the Middle East.

Military analysts are doubtful that the threat is fully substantive, noting that Iraq would need an arsenal of accurate missiles to carry out the boasts. But Iraq’s mid-range missile development has jumped alarmingly since cross-border missiles were first introduced to the Middle East during the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq War.

The foreign ministers of the Arab Cooperation Council, ostensibly an economic alliance, decided the time was right to once again try to tie Israel’s nuclear hands.

Nick Williams reported from Nicosia and Daniel Williams from Jerusalem.