Clinton Tries to Speed Up Peace Talks

President Clinton rejoined the Israeli-Syrian peace talks Thursday, hoping to persuade the Middle East antagonists to speed up the pace of negotiations that have produced a few new ideas but no real progress toward agreement.

Clinton arrived by helicopter just before 5 p.m. and immediately went into separate meetings with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak and Syrian Foreign Minister Farouk Shareh.

The delegations had been marking time Thursday awaiting Clinton’s arrival. The committees of experts that were announced Wednesday didn’t meet at all Thursday, but officials said all four panels were expected to convene today.

White House Press Secretary Joe Lockhart said Clinton considered his talks with Barak and Shareh to be “good, constructive meetings.”

Earlier, State Department spokesman James P. Rubin said U.S. officials weren’t satisfied with the tempo of the talks, which began Monday. “We are looking for ways to accelerate the pace,” he said before Clinton arrived. “That doesn’t mean that nothing is happening, but it just means that we would like to do more.”

Later, after Clinton’s intervention, Rubin said the pace had picked up slightly.

Nevertheless, face-to-face meetings between Israelis and Syrians remain very rare. Most of the work of the conference has so far been done with the U.S. mediators meeting separately with the Israelis and the Syrians.

Sources in the Israeli and Syrian delegations said the talks were stuck on the same procedural issue that U.S. officials thought they had settled Tuesday. Syrian delegates are demanding immediate consideration of an Israeli withdrawal from the strategic Golan Heights, which Israel seized during the 1967 Middle East War. Israel wants to make some progress first on security guarantees and on the nature of peaceful relations between the two governments.

But U.S. officials suggested that the impasse will melt away if the Israelis and the Syrians sense the chance to make progress on other issues. An Israeli official said his delegation, at least, “does not consider this to be a waste of time.”

Rubin said Israeli, Syrian and U.S. delegations all have offered some “new ideas.”

“It’s fair to say that both parties have heard more about the positions of the other side than they knew when they were coming in,” he said without elaborating.

As the talks dragged on, opposition to Israel’s participation appeared to be growing in Jerusalem, even within Barak’s own Cabinet.

Eli Yishai, the soft-spoken leader of the ultra-Orthodox Shas Party and the labor minister in Barak’s government, publicly urged the prime minister to suspend the negotiations with Syria and return home to consult with his Cabinet. Yishai, in an interview with Israel Radio, said the apparent deadlock in the talks--which he blamed on the Syrians--called for a “reevaluation” of the situation.

In Shepherdstown, however, an Israeli official said Barak has decided to remain through the weekend and continue negotiations into next week. He did not say how long Barak is prepared to stay.

Several of Barak’s Cabinet members have complained that they haven’t been consulted on specifics of the negotiations and don’t know what Barak may be preparing to offer the Syrians in exchange for peace.

“I, too, yearn for peace,” said Yishai, whose party has been a strong supporter of the peace process. “But if we want to convince the people, we must know what is in the agreement, and we must first be persuaded ourselves.”

A poll released Thursday indicated that the Israeli public is still deeply divided over whether a peace with Syria is worth the price of withdrawal from the Golan Heights. The telephone survey, by the Tami Steinmetz Center for Peace Research at Tel Aviv University, showed that 55% of respondents favor keeping the Golan and doing without a peace agreement.

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Times staff writer Rebecca Trounson in Jerusalem contributed to this report.