Israel Rejects Baker’s Peace Talk Censure : Shamir’s Conditions for Negotiations Unchanged, Aide Says

Israel today rejected criticism from Secretary of State James A. Baker III and asserted that Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir has not hardened his conditions for peace talks.

Shamir’s media adviser, Avi Pazner, said Washington had not given Israel’s new right-wing government a minimum grace period. And he said the Jerusalem Post had misquoted the premier on his terms for talking to the Palestinians.

The newspaper quoted Shamir Wednesday as saying Palestinians would have to accept the Israeli idea of autonomy for the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip before talks began.

Criticizing these conditions in Congress, Baker gave out the White House telephone number and told Israel: “When you’re serious about peace, call us.”

A spokesman said President Bush agrees with Baker but added that the White House assigns “no blame” for the breakdown in negotiations.

“The thrust of Secretary Baker’s comments, and our view is that we’ve worked long and hard for the peace process,” presidential spokesman Marlin Fitzwater added. “We have worked with all the parties in the region in trying to get a dialogue going, but in the final analysis the parties of the region have to want peace to have it happen.

“We can’t want it for them,” he continued. “What he (Baker) was saying basically is that if they want peace to get a dialogue going, then give us a call.”

Fitzwater added: “We are careful to take no sides. Israel is a strong and loyal ally, a staunch friend.”

Shamir’s spokesman, Pazner, said: “Every new government gets a period of grace when it takes its functions.

“Sometimes the period is 100 days, sometimes it’s a few weeks. I think here we weren’t even given 100 hours of grace.”

He said Shamir’s rightist-religious coalition was formed only three days ago and “of course has not had the time to decide how to proceed with the peace process.”

Pazner claimed that Shamir had never made the remark about Palestinians having to accept autonomy before talks started.

He said the prime minister’s office had complained to the Jerusalem Post. Editor David Gross said he had not received any complaint.

It was not the first time Shamir’s office had sought to deny a remark by the hard-line premier that caused an international furor.

In January, aides tried to play down Shamir’s statement that a “big Israel” was needed to absorb a wave of Jewish immigrants from the Soviet Union, a remark widely seen as justifying holding the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip forever.

The new coalition also hardened Israel’s terms by spelling out in its policy guidelines that Arabs from Israeli-annexed East Jerusalem may not vote or run in proposed Palestinian elections and that autonomy would not apply there.

With state-run Israel radio and television paralyzed by a general strike, the country’s only functioning radio station, run by the army, broadcast Baker’s comments repeatedly.