Israel Holds to Its Boycott of Dec. 4 Talks

The government of Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir on Sunday reaffirmed its decision to boycott the Dec. 4 starting date for the Washington round of Middle East peace talks after a refusal by the United States to guarantee conditions on the future course of negotiations, senior officials said.

Shamir’s Cabinet had been expected to reconsider a decision taken last week to delay Israel’s participation until Dec. 9. While Israel’s ambassador to Washington presented the Bush Administration with a series of requests, including a firm U.S. commitment to move the talks to the Middle East, government officials here built up expectations of a compromise deal. It didn’t come off.

“The United States has given Israel no reason to change our decision,” Shamir was quoted by government radio as saying.

The Americans sent a four-point answer, senior officials said. That letter pledged that all matters taken up in the talks will be handled directly between the negotiating sides; that the United States will encourage direct contacts between the adversaries; that the United States will occasionally offer ideas in case of a stalemate, and that it is “logical” that talks move to the Middle East “at an appropriate time.”

“Appropriate time? Logical?” asked government spokesman Yossi Olmert. “It is all vague. This changes nothing.”

The Washington meetings are meant to be a continuation of face-to-face talks held a month ago in Madrid between Israel and each of its closest Arab adversaries: Syria and Lebanon plus Jordan and the Palestinians in a single delegation. The Madrid round ended without agreement over where to hold subsequent sessions. The Arabs wanted to stay in Madrid or some other European capital; Israel wanted talks alternated among capitals of the Middle East as a demonstration of Arab goodwill.

The Bush Administration, after concluding that parties themselves were unlikely ever to agree on when and where to resume the talks, invited everyone to come to Washington this Wednesday. The Arabs accepted.

Israel opposed the move on the grounds that the Administration was dictating the pace and substance of the talks in place of the participants themselves. As a protest, the Shamir government decided to delay its arrival until next Monday, pleading that it needed time to prepare.

It soon became clear that the delay was a public relations disaster, and Jerusalem tried to win face-saving concessions from Washington, without success.

On Sunday, right-wing politicians and members of Shamir’s inner circle expressed bitterness. “The way this thing is being conducted by the United States very much bothers us and outrages us,” said Yosef Ben-Aharon, a top aide to Shamir and head of the Israeli negotiating team for talks with Syria.

“We see that the Arab states, the Arab elements with whom we must conduct negotiations, have the impression the United States is on their side,” Ben-Aharon said on radio.

Rehavam Zeevi, a minister without portfolio, said that Washington is treating Israel like a “tribe of Indians that was put into a reservation.” Zeevi, who favors forcibly moving the Arabs to other countries from the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip, once called Bush “anti-Semitic.”

The dispute between the United States and Israel aggravates an already tense period of relations. Visibly cool to the demands of its ally, the Bush Administration has delayed backing for loan guarantees that Israel wants to fund projects to help provide jobs and housing to new Soviet immigrants. Israel considers the delay to be a form of pressure to prod Israel during the peace talks.

The issue of the loan guarantees is scheduled to be taken up again in January, when Israel’s allies in Congress may press for action.

Bush and Shamir differ over the means of forging peace in the Middle East and this has been the basis for the recent chill in relations. Bush views land won by Israel in the 1967 Middle East War as capital that Israel should spend to gain peace treaties with the Arabs. Shamir is committed to keeping the land under Israeli control and considers the conflict to be rooted solely in Arab intransigence and unwillingness to accept Israel as a neighbor.