Clinton Trip Produces No Breakthroughs

President Clinton ended a three-day Middle East peace mission Tuesday having failed to move Israelis and Palestinians any closer together but given impetus to a future Palestinian state.

Before returning to Washington, where he faces possible impeachment, Clinton and his family toured Bethlehem, where they prayed, decorated a Christmas tree in Manger Square and sang carols with Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat. Then they visited Masada, site of a 1st century episode of Jewish martyrdom.

The sightseeing followed a summit that Clinton held with Arafat and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in hopes of boosting the October land-for-security accord that the U.S. president helped broker.

There were no breakthroughs. Clinton could not persuade Israel to meet Friday’s deadline to withdraw more troops from the West Bank, as mandated under the accord. Israel insisted that the Palestinians first fulfill a long list of commitments. Netanyahu also rejected compromise on the release of Palestinian prisoners from Israeli jails.

Acknowledging “fits and starts” in the execution of the accord, Clinton said he believes that the lines of communication between Israelis and Palestinians are open again after breaking down over mutual recriminations and alleged violations of the agreement.

“I have achieved what I came here to achieve,” Clinton said.

Israeli and Palestinian officials, however, painted a far bleaker picture. Despite efforts by U.S. officials to put the best face possible on what was clearly a disappointing meeting, the discord was obvious: Arafat left the session early, and the three leaders did not issue a joint statement or appear together.

Netanyahu handed Clinton a 12-point list of commitments he said the Palestinians have failed to live up to, including the confiscation of illegal weapons. Arafat’s aides later accused the Israelis of procrastination and sabotage.

As worried as the Israelis are about Palestinian violations and violence, however, the dominant motivating force behind the aggressive positions Netanyahu took throughout the Clinton visit was the Israeli leader’s political turmoil.

Under attack from its own right wing, Netanyahu’s government is in high danger of falling next week, and showing defiance before the U.S. president--a weakened one, especially--was designed as a way for him to win points among wavering supporters.

Netanyahu, speaking at a nationally televised news conference after the meeting broke up Tuesday, said Israel had held up its end of the bargain by relinquishing an initial chunk of West Bank land and allowing the inauguration of a Palestinian airport.

“I think the Americans are wise enough to understand that no amount of pressure will force us to relinquish our capital, Jerusalem; that no amount of pressure will force us to release terrorist murderers; that no amount of pressure will force us to make withdrawals while Palestinians don’t do their part,” he said.

Clinton had barely left Israeli airspace when talk here returned to Netanyahu’s looming showdown with his political foes. Like Clinton, Netanyahu could soon find himself out of a job.

As early as Monday, the Israeli leader faces a no-confidence vote in parliament that will force new elections if he loses. Pressure is mounting on Netanyahu to accelerate the process by announcing elections ahead of the no-confidence motion, sparing himself embarrassment.

On Tuesday, in another sign of political disarray for Netanyahu’s center-right coalition, Finance Minister Yaacov Neeman announced that he will quit. Neeman was said to be frustrated over the failure of the Knesset, as parliament is known, to pass a budget, a delay that is symptomatic of the general paralysis of Netanyahu’s fractured government.

Signing the October agreement, which gives an additional 13% of West Bank land to the Palestinians in stages, was a politically explosive step for Netanyahu and has cost him the support of much of the right wing, whose members object to relinquishing biblical lands.

Under the accord, the Palestinians are also obliged to carry out a program of concrete measures aimed at combating anti-Israeli terrorism. On Tuesday, Israeli army intelligence chief Amos Malka told a Knesset committee that Palestinian authorities had not dismantled terrorist infrastructure and had lost control over “the height of the flames” in the streets, meaning they could not contain the rioting that has racked the West Bank in recent weeks.

Protests demanding the release of Palestinian prisoners have turned into violent clashes with Israeli troops, leaving at least four Palestinians dead and scores injured. On Tuesday, Clinton announced agreement on an “informal channel” to work on the prisoner issue, but Israeli officials said it did not go beyond already existing procedures to review individual cases.

Clinton did accomplish a specific goal of his trip. As required by the October agreement, he traveled to Gaza City on Monday and witnessed the decision of the Palestine National Council to void clauses in its charter that call for the destruction of Israel.

Netanyahu had insisted on this step but apparently did not anticipate the pageantry that would accompany the first visit to Palestinian territory by a sitting U.S. president.

The extraordinary reception given Clinton boosted the Palestinians’ goal of statehood and sealed their new-era relationship with Washington.

“President Clinton’s visit has turned the Palestinian Authority into a state-in-the-making,” political analyst Hemi Shalev said in Israel’s Maariv newspaper Tuesday, “and publicly demonstrated the change for the worse in the balance of intimate relations between Israel and the Palestinians on one hand, and Israel and the United States on the other.”

Palestinians who joyfully celebrated that recognition Monday were complaining Tuesday about the latest snag with the Israelis.

“I fear that there will never be a day in which Israel will say that we are keeping our commitments,” said Ziad abu Ziad, one of Arafat’s associates in the Palestinian Authority.

Still, chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat met Tuesday afternoon with Netanyahu’s Cabinet secretary, Danny Naveh, and promised to provide documentation within 48 hours showing fulfillment of many of the steps in dispute, Israeli officials said.

Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, speaking in Amman, Jordan, where she briefed Crown Prince Hassan, urged both parties to the agreement to honor their obligations. Any delay in the next phase of Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank would be unfortunate, she said.

“I think it’s a bumpy track, but it’s on track,” Clinton’s national security advisor, Samuel R. “Sandy” Berger, said later in Bethlehem, referring to the peace process. “But we need to kind of now kick this thing into higher gear.”

* ALLEGORY FOR CLINTON: From Masada to Church of the Nativity, ancient lands echo president’s predicament. A29