NEWS ANALYSIS Tiny window of opportunity emerges from London talks

LONDON, May 5 (JTA) — The London talks may not be the failure they appear to be. As the parties packed their bags Tuesday afternoon, both Israeli and Palestinian officials stressed that although the talks had not produced a breakthrough, neither had they broken down. “Significant differences remain,” said one Israeli official, “but although the gaps have not been bridged, we will continue. The procedures are still intact and the contacts will go on.” The talks involved a dizzying bout of separate meetings at three central London hotels involving U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat. And when they were over, Albright invited the Israeli and Palestinian leaders to come to Washington next week — if they could reach an agreement for advancing the peace process before then. The “if” is key here, and the future of the peace process now depends on what transpires during the next week. Before the Israelis and Palestinians travel to the U.S. capital, they must first resolve their differences regarding a widely reported American proposal under which Israel would redeploy from an additional 13 percent of the West Bank in exchange for specific Palestinian steps to live up to their part of already-signed agreements. But can the two sides resolve those differences in a matter of days after having failed to do so in London? According to Israeli officials who spoke on condition of anonymity, the answer is a ringing yes. These officials say that Israel will accept the American proposals in some form, even though Netanyahu has staunchly opposed the 13 percent figure from the start. “In some form” will likely mean that Israel will present some modifications to the American plan — but just the same, the officials are confident that there will be an agreement soon. Analysts suggest that Netanyahu may be willing to bend somewhat because Albright has said that if the two sides come to Washington on May 11, as invited, the meeting would set the stage for launching the final-status talks — something that Israel has long been seeking. Indeed, Albright herself hinted of flexibility on the part of the Israeli government when she told a news conference just before leaving London on Tuesday afternoon that Netanyahu had been “helpful and constructive in his thinking across a whole range of issues.” To some extent, the optimism that the process will resume after more than a year of deadlock rests on the political wisdom which dictates that success or failure in peacemaking depends not so much on matters of ideology, but rather on hard-headed pragmatism and a fine calculation of self-interest. The encouraging signs from London this week are that, whatever intermediate hurdles must be overcome, Israeli and Palestinian leaders appear to regard the success of the process as vital to their personal and national interests and neither side appears willing to take the fateful step of torpedoing the process. Netanyahu might well feel constrained by right-wing elements in his Cabinet. Indeed, he told Albright that he did not have this body”s authorization to make a final decision in London. But just the same, he is a consummate political operator who keeps one eye on winning the next election and the other on the polls — which consistently show that the overwhelming majority of Israelis support progress in the peace process. Netanyahu, who successfully ran on a platform of “Peace With Security” in 1996, is likely to win a second term in 2000 if he can deliver on this cautiously pragmatic approach. A breakdown in the peace process is not in his interests — nor in those of Arafat, who, confronted by a burgeoning challenge from Islamic militants, faces potentially perilous domestic questions about his credibility. Despite the lack of tangible progress in London, both leaders will need to show some progress — and soon. While Netanyahu”s longer-term strategic interest may be focused on winning the next election, Arafat wants to realize his dream of declaring an independent Palestinian state on May 4, 1999, the scheduled date for the conclusion of the final-status talks. This dream has complicated already-difficult negotiations: Arafat”s repeated declaration that he will declare an independent state next May with or without a final-status agreement has made Netanyahu particularly distrustful. Netanyahu, deeply suspicious of his Palestinian partner, does not trust Arafat to deliver on the security agreements to which he is already committed. And now, confronted with the issue of further redeployments from the West Bank, he is reluctant to take a step that will help the Palestinian leader make a unilateral declaration of independence. As Netanyahu flew back to Jerusalem, he might have reflected that the London meetings represented a net gain. For the talks to proceed, he will have to come up with something akin to the 13 percent further redeployment envisioned in the U.S. proposal. But, Israeli sources said, he used the London meetings to nail down a watertight, verifiable timetable of Palestinian compliance on security matters. His initial five-hour meeting with Albright on Monday did indeed focus on the core issue of redeployment, the sources said. But more important from his perspective, he had the opportunity to attempt to change the terms of the debate by proposing what they called a “new conceptual framework” for negotiations. The question of redeployment would, of course, continue to be a feature of the talks, the sources said. But according to the new script, it would no longer attract top billing. Rather, redeployment would be just one item on what a senior Israeli government official described as a “comprehensive menu of negotiating topics.” Redeployment would thus be locked into a slew of other issues, which include the Palestinian Authority”s amending the Palestinian Covenant, extraditing terrorist suspects to Israel, confiscating unauthorized weapons and destroying the terrorist infrastructures of Islamic radicals in the self-rule areas. The new concept would have the effect of diluting the territorial dimension of the negotiations, increasing the focus on security issues and reducing what the Israeli officials perceive as “the unequal pressure on Israel.”” Israeli officials complain that while they are negotiating on the basis of the land-for-peace formula, the reality is that almost all the attention is on the land that Israel would hand over, with comparatively little attention on the peace that the Palestinians would offer in return. As a result, a senior Israeli official said, Netanyahu offered a proposal to make each of the Palestinian steps as concrete and tangible as the land Israel would transfer. According to the official, Albright found enough merit in Netanyahu”s proposal to carry it directly to Arafat. Indeed, the talks extended one day beyond the intended timetable, and U.S. State Department officials are expected to continue working with the parties through the week. Thus the London talks, earlier billed as make-or-break by the Palestinians, have instead created a new, albeit tiny, window of opportunity. And the Israelis, at least, contend they will be coming to Washington. Only time will tell.