Emergency Talks on Mideast Fail to Resolve Disputes

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat ended their emergency Middle East summit Wednesday without resolving any of the disputes that had convulsed their region into deadly violence, although they ordered aides to start a new round of negotiations on the minutiae of peace.

President Clinton, who presided over the meetings, proclaimed them a success because Netanyahu and Arafat talked to each other here after months of silent hostility. But he conceded: “We have not made as much progress as I wish we had.”

Clinton said that Israeli and Palestinian officials below Cabinet rank will start open-ended talks Sunday aimed at hammering out the details involved in carrying out the 1993 Israeli-Palestinian peace accords, including the long-stalled redeployment of Israeli forces now in the West Bank town of Hebron.

But Netanyahu rejected everything on Arafat’s priority list, refusing to set a target date for Hebron redeployment, vowing to keep open a disputed archeological tunnel in Jerusalem and refusing to lift the closure of the West Bank, which has kept thousands of Palestinians from reaching jobs in Israel.

By contrast, Netanyahu obtained from Arafat a pledge to settle differences at the bargaining table and not in the streets, the top item on the Israeli priority list.

Even before he arrived in Washington, Netanyahu said he was ready for continuous talks on the details of peace. As it turned out, an agreement to do that was the only concrete achievement of the two-day summit.

The limited results came despite an all-night bargaining session by Israeli and Palestinian officials.

One participant said the talks went well Tuesday when Netanyahu and Arafat were talking about general principles but foundered when lower-ranking officials tried to turn to matters of substance.

Although Clinton sought to portray the meetings as a success for both sides, the Israelis clearly were jubilant and the Palestinians crestfallen. Netanyahu told a news conference in a downtown hotel that the talks helped to “cement the principle that the path to peace is through negotiations and not through violence.”

He said that his meetings with Arafat helped to establish a new level of trust between the two sides.

Arafat canceled a scheduled news conference and headed for the airport without talking to reporters.

In the Middle East, Israeli and Palestinian analysts agreed on very little, but they were in accord that Netanyahu was the clear winner.

“For Netanyahu, from the point of view of his own constituency, this is a victory,” said Khalil Shikaki, director of the Center for Palestinian Research and Studies in the West Bank town of Nablus. “For Arafat, this is an unmitigated disaster. He comes back empty-handed. I don’t know what he can say to his constituency.”

Mark Heller, a senior fellow of the Jaffee Center for Strategic Studies at Tel Aviv University, said that unless the Sunday talks make unexpectedly good progress, Israel, the West Bank and Gaza Strip are in danger of a renewal of last week’s fighting that left at least 75 people dead.

“We’ll be lucky to get through Sunday, and if they don’t move quickly after Sunday, there will be serious confrontations,” Heller said.

Clinton was the only leader to speak at an unusual White House news conference concluding the talks. In an clear indication of the acrimonious nature of the talks, Clinton said that all parties agreed that he would be the only speaker in a bid to avoid rekindling controversy in public.

“Let’s don’t kid around,” Clinton said. “I mean, what we’re trying to do is to avoid saying anything that will make our progress more difficult.”

As Clinton talked, Netanyahu, Arafat and King Hussein of Jordan sat stony faced behind him and said nothing.

At his own news conference later, Netanyahu had the look of a winner. He appeared pleased and confident.

At one point he cut off an aide attempting to end the session so he could elaborate on a question.

Clinton opened his remarks with a statement that he indicated had been approved by Netanyahu and Arafat.

Clinton said the summit succeeded in establishing a new working relationship between Netanyahu and Arafat, whose only previous meeting had been chilly and perfunctory. This time they talked for several hours.

“The Israelis and Palestinians clearly are talking again at the highest levels,” Clinton said. “I believe the calm, constructive, face-to-face meetings Prime Minister Netanyahu and Chairman Arafat have had here will help to build trust between them and promote progress on the issues that still divide them.

“The prime minister and Chairman Arafat have recommitted themselves to a nonviolent future, to renouncing violence in the resolution of their disputes.

“They are ready to renew and intensify negotiations on implementing the interim agreement, with Hebron as the first priority,” the president added.

“I would say that the problems that exploded last week in violence, that the problems are still there, the differences are still there,” he said. “But I believe there is a higher level of understanding and a higher level of trust than existed before these talks began.”

Clinton said he would send the administration’s Middle East trouble-shooter, Dennis B. Ross, to participate in the talks at the Erez crossing point between Israel and the Gaza Strip.

Administration officials said that Secretary of State Warren Christopher may visit the region soon, although no date has been set.

Netanyahu said at his news conference that his government is committed to withdrawing Israeli troops from most of Hebron, a tinder-box city where 450 Jewish settlers live in the midst of a city of 100,000 Palestinians.

But he said he will not do so until he believes that the security of the Jewish settlers can be guaranteed.

Under the Israeli-Palestinian peace accord, the troops were supposed to have been redeployed by March, but Netanyahu’s predecessor, Prime Minister Shimon Peres, postponed the move after deadly bus bombings in Israel.

Netanyahu’s position on Hebron was the same after the summit as it had been before.

Hassan Asfour, the chief Palestinian negotiator with Israel, said that as long as Israel’s position was unchanged, the summit served no useful purpose.

“I don’t think it was necessary to go to Washington to start negotiations on Sunday,” Asfour said.

Uri Savir, an official of the Peres government and one of the architects of the 1993 peace agreement negotiated in Oslo, told Israeli television: “How long can you go on saying you are going to implement the agreement when you are in fact against it. If [Netanyahu] went wearing the clothes of Oslo, then the emperor has no clothes. If he is wearing other clothes, then they should say what those are.”

Kempster reported from Washington and Miller from Jerusalem.