Clinton Reported Ready to Resume PLO Talks : Diplomacy: Announcement will come today, officials say. President also pledges to aid Israel if peace pact fails.

President Clinton, who Thursday proclaimed the peace accord between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization one of the century’s “huge developments,” intends to resume talks with the PLO that were halted after a terrorist attack on Israel three years ago, Administration officials said.

At the same time, Clinton promised Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin that the United States would come to Israel’s aid if the pact crumbled and led to war.

The President’s remarks and the promise of a renewed relationship with the Palestine Liberation Organization came after Clinton learned of the mutual recognition agreement Thursday between Israel and the PLO. Officials said that the President intends to announce today the resumption of talks with the PLO.

Even though the President’s decision follows Israel’s own recognition of the PLO, it is sure to be politically controversial in this country, where the organization is widely distrusted by much of the influential Jewish community and by many of Israel’s other U.S. supporters.

But Middle East experts said that Clinton had little choice if the United States is to resume its role as the primary go-between in Middle East negotiations. Last month’s Israeli-Palestinian accord over control of the West Bank and Gaza Strip resulted from secret talks in Oslo that bypassed the Administration, largely because of Washington’s boycott of the PLO.

Despite the U.S. government’s limited role in that agreement, the pact will be signed at the White House on Monday. An Administration official said that both Israelis and Palestinians want the ceremony to take place in Washington to underline the important U.S. role in the continuing peace process.

Furthermore, the official said, both Israelis and Palestinians hope that high-profile American participation will make it easier for them to win approval of the agreement from their own constituents and to quell widespread criticism of it among both Israelis and Palestinians.

White House and State Department officials said that as many as 1,000 dignitaries will watch the ceremony on the White House South Lawn. Among them are likely to be all five living former Presidents; their secretaries of state, and foreign ministers from Russia, major U.S. allies and Middle Eastern nations.

White House officials also are preparing for the possibility that Israel and the PLO may decide that the agreements should be signed by their respective chief executives--Rabin and Yasser Arafat.

Officials said that they do not yet know whether Rabin is prepared to accord Arafat the level of recognition that would be implied by sharing a signing ceremony with him. But they noted that doing so would provide a powerful symbol--one that might erase some memories of Arafat’s last appearance in the United States, when he wore a gun during a speech at the United Nations.

Clinton was aboard Air Force One on his way to Cleveland when he learned in a telephone call from National Security Adviser Anthony Lake that Israel and the PLO had exchanged letters of mutual recognition--a crucial precursor to the signing of the larger agreement.

He then called Rabin in Jerusalem to offer congratulations and to reaffirm U.S. support.

After arriving in Cleveland, Clinton told reporters that he had assured Rabin that the United States will attempt to minimize any risks that might accompany the peace process.

Members of the opposition Likud Party in Israel have charged that the accord will strengthen the PLO and increase the danger of Palestinian violence against Israel. Israeli supporters of the pact, joined by U.S. officials, hope that the PLO will keep its promises to put aside terrorism.

Clinton said that the United States was ready to resume contacts with the PLO if the organization “meets the criteria we have repeatedly set down--renouncing terrorism, acknowledging Israel’s right to exist, those things.”

PLO Chairman Arafat met those conditions to the satisfaction of the Ronald Reagan Administration in December, 1988, launching a low-key dialogue that lasted until June, 1990. But the relationship was broken off by George Bush, who was then president, after the Palestine Liberation Front, led by PLO Executive Committee member Abul Abbas, attempted a terrorist attack on Israelis on a beach near Tel Aviv. Four guerrillas were killed and 12 captured. No Israelis were hurt.

Bush said that the talks would not resume until Arafat and the PLO explicitly denounced the raid and disciplined Abbas. Despite his exchange of letters of recognition with Israel, Arafat has not yet taken those steps. However, a senior State Department official said that the Administration will “take account of the fact that we have a very different world, the circumstances are very different.”

The resumption of contacts with the PLO will improve U.S. credentials to broker the additional negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians that will be required to convert the declaration of principles into a full-blown peace treaty.