In fact, underneath the rancor the climate was different. The Palestinian delegation–which at Israel’s insistence did not include members of the Palestine Liberation Organization–presented a face of moderation to the world. Ignoring Syrian pressure, the Palestinians and Jordanians agreed at the end of the conference to proceed to Act II: their first bilateral session with Israel in Madrid on Sunday. But Syria, which earlier had agreed to Baker’s plan for direct talks with Israel four days after the opening conference began, suddenly balked in a dispute with Israel over the site. Baker, meeting in his hotel suite late that afternoon with Egyptian Foreign Minister Amr Moussa and Saudi Arabian Prince Bandar bin Sultan, was furious at the Syrians apparent betrayal. “They gave their word!” Baker kept saying. But Moussa and Bandar told Baker they thought the Syrians were playing a game of chicken, and would bend with a little more persuasion. In a tense meeting at the Ritz Hotel later, an angry Moussa warned an equally angry Syrian Foreign Minister Farouk al-Sharaa, “You will lose if you do not attend.” Said an adviser to one Arab team, “It was high theater, but Jim Baker still holds all the cards.”
This was not how the process was meant to unfold. Baker’s intention was to let the parties learn how to talk to each other on their own. The mutually agreed rules carefully stipulate that no third party can be involved in Israel’s face-to-face negotiations with Syria, Lebanon or the joint Jordanian-Palestinian delegation unless both sides agree. But Arabs and Israelis alike are predicting that the United States will have to have hands on at every stage. For one thing, said several Arab diplomats, the parties still need the political cover of making concessions to Washington rather than to each other. In addition, they said, most of the participants are genuinely afraid of the course they’ve embarked on. “Left to our own devices, we cannot make peace alone,” said Hanan Ashrawi, speaking for the Palestinians, “because the history of the conflict is too long and too bitter.”
Last week’s conference demonstrated just how painstaking the American attention will have to be. Baker, his aides and their Saudi and Egyptian helpmates carefully coached the parties on the content and style of public remarks before the conference began. Moussa and Bandar each made private visits to Syrian President Hafez Assad in the days leading up to the conference, urging him to be flexible. “For two weeks now, the Americans have had only one message for all of us: be upbeat,” said an Arab diplomat. The coaching paid off. In Madrid, the speeches stretched the limits of the rules laid out beforehand, but did not break them. When a Palestinian mentioned “loyalty to our leadership,” clearly meaning the proscribed PLO, a member of the Israeli team concluded, “the only question is, how is the U.S. referee going to call this ball?” The Americans let it ride.
The political logistics were designed to avoid pointless occasions for confrontation: no meals together for the different delegations, for example. The conference table was just wide enough to rule out even the opportunity for ritual handshakes. The seating arrangements were heavy with political symbolism. Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir was forced to sit directly across from Haidar Abdul Shafi, the leader of the Palestinian delegation. And Baker, who had been personally impressed by the Palestinians’ courage during preparations for the conference, insisted on giving them equal speaking time instead of making them share a 45-minute slot with their Jordanian delegation partners. The Israelis weren’t happy. “Ever since we agreed to this conference, we don’t negotiate with the Americans. We get orders,” grumbled one Israeli aide.
Still, the two sides did bridge gaps. The leader of the Palestinian delegation, Abdul Shafi, delivered an opening speech devoid of threats and imprecations. Condemnations of the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza alternated with appeals to Israeli humaneness. “You have dared to stir up hopes that cannot be abandoned,” he said. “There was very little uplifting of spirit-nothing comparable to when Sadat walked into the Knesset,” said a senior Israeli diplomat. “They said some quite harsh things, but they said them very elegantly, and they seemed to be reaching out.” The evidence was everywhere: Palestinians and Israelis mingled in the confines of the conference hall and in the outer rooms over coffee. More than once, Baker’s chief Mideast adviser, Dennis Ross, found he had to interrupt an Israeli and a Palestinian deep in conversation during a break to ask one or the other a question.
Madrid may have changed the Palestinian image even inside Israel. Ashrawi, Abdul Shafi and top adviser Faisal Husseini all speak the language of pragmatism. As Ashrawi said in her final press conference, “We have learned that you cannot have everything you want when you want it, immediately.” Onlookers were impressed. “You could see them thinking about how to appeal to the Israeli public, and they had an advantage in that,” said a Baker aide. “They’ve lived with the Israelis long enough to actually understand how to appeal to them. " By the end of the conference, no one was even engaging in the fiction of talking about the “joint Jordanian-Palestinian delegation”–the political cover Shamir had insisted on. Even the Israelis were talking about “the Palestinians.”
The Syrians, on the other hand, didn’t get the Baker strategy at all. There was no mingling with the Israeli delegation, inside or outside the palace. Foreign Minister al-Sharaa’s speech was intransigent on the issue of territory: “Every inch of Arab land must be returned,” he said. Al-Sharaa also attacked Shamir in graphic personal terms, holding up a copy of a “Wanted” poster, issued by the British in 1947, seeking Shamir’s arrest as a terrorist. His performance only played into Shamir’s hands. “Sharaa was the kind of Arab we’ve always imagined as our enemy,” said a senior Israeli diplomat. “Harsh, hard-line, aggressive, abusive.”
The first set of bilaterals in Madrid will stick to procedural issues: where future negotiations should be held, and how frequently. The location issue is a tricky one, but the likely compromise is Washington, making it easier for Baker to stage-manage the ensuing sessions. In any case, the substance is far more intractable. In Lebanon, perhaps the ripest prospect, the obvious compromise would have Israel withdraw from its “security zone” in southern Lebanon under U.N. Resolution 425 of 1978. Syria would remove its troops under the Arabs’ own Taif accord of 1989. By technically acting under separate auspices, the two sides wouldn’t have to admit that they were compromising with each other.
The likely compromise on the Golan Heights, annexed by Israel in 1981 (map, page 32), would involve a trade of sovereignty for security. Israel could withdraw from the heights and allow Syria to replant its flag there-so long as the area became a demilitarized zone for both sides with U.N. or U.S. security guarantees. The hardest issue will always be the occupied territories. Both sides have agreed to negotiate some form of limited self-government for the Palestinians for a five-year transition period, but it will take ingenuity to find a mutually acceptable form of autonomy. So far, none of the parties has agreed to confidence-building measures-such as suspension of the Arab economic boycott in return for a freeze on settlements in the territories-that would generate political support for future compromise. Disturbed by their refusal, Baker vowed to keep pushing. “The Americans will be on the other side of a glass door, watching,” said an Arab diplomat, “and the minute the two sides start to quarrel, the Americans will … come into the room.” As Baker said last week, “The U.S. is and will be an honest broker. " In context, it sounded as much like a threat as a promise.
PHOTOS:Face-off in Madrid: Palestinians Abdul Shafi, Ashrawi and Husseini; Shamir/BERNARD BISSON–SYGMA
THE LINES THAT DIVIDE LAND Every inch of Arab land occupied by the Israelis by war and force… must be returned in their entirety to their legitimate owners.
Farouk al-Sharaa, Syrian foreign minister
It will be regrettable if the talks focus primarily and exclusively on territory. It is the quickest way to an impasse.
Yitzhak Shamir, Israeli prime minister
Remove the barbed wire, restore the land and its life-giving water… the status of the occupied territories is being decided each day by Israeli bulldozers.
Haidar Abdul Shafi, Palestinian delegate
We appeal to you to shun dictators like Saddam Hussein who aim to destroy Israel, stop the brutal torture and murder of those who do not agree with you.
Yitzhak Shamir, Israeli prime minister
Thousands of our brothers and sisters are languishing In Israeli prisons… many cruelly mistreated and tortured in interrogation, guilty only of seeking freedom.
Haidar Abdul Shafi, Palestinian delegate
