Land For Peace

Conventional wisdom holds that it's a miracle that the international conference on the Middle East even opened at all, and that any resolution of the region's intractable problems is months or even years away.It is vital to understand that time is not on the side of peace, especially in light of the stated determination of the present Israeli government to continue to build settlements on the West Bank.Every American president since Lyndon Johnson has maintained that the settlements are either illegal or are obstacles to peace, for the simple reason that settlements amount to the incremental annexation of the West Bank into Israel proper.

WASHINGTON -- In Israel yesterday, Ariel Sharon's allies and his adversaries were praying for his life. But even if the man who has fought or led Israel in every war since its independence does not survive this battle against a massive stroke, his five years as prime minister have already left a remarkable stamp on the history of his country. During that time, Mr. Sharon registered three main accomplishments. The first was to defeat the Palestinian uprising he inherited when he took over Israel's government in 2001.

Don't blame Israel or worldwide Jewry if the ''land for peace''slogan evokes only sardonic laughter. The Zionist movement has been surrendering land since early in the century, and peace has never been the result.Palestine, the land upon which Israel was settled, is now regarded as being located west of the Jordan River. In fact, until the end of World War I, historic Palestine was not only the West Bank but all or most of what is now the Kingdom of Jordan.Hence, when Lord Balfour's famous declaration was issued in 1917 -- ''His Majesty's government views with favor the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish People . . .'' -- he meant the Palestine as defined at that time.

RA'ANANA, Israel - It's really simple psychology. Reward a behavior, and you'll see more of it. Don't reward it, and it'll eventually disappear. Reinforce the wrong behavior, and you create a mess. Nowhere are these simple rules more apparent or applicable than in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict of the last few decades. And in the application of psychology, the Palestinians, until now, have had the upper hand. View the Middle East as a psychological conflict, and the lines are fairly well drawn.

IF THE gulf war reminded Israelis of the threat to their existence from an Arab state, it did the same to many Arab states. To Arab states in the coalition, the monster was proved to be, not the old bugbear, Israel, but the enemy within, Iraq.For Israelis, the war was yet another indication of the fundamental fact that, for good or bad, they are part of the Middle East and will have to live with Arabs. Once their separate realizations coalesce, Arab and Jew may be more willing to give peace a chance, the former by accepting that Israel is real, and the latter by trading land for peace.

The Israeli Cabinet yesterday approved that country's participation in the Mideast peace conference by a 16-3 vote. The government maintains it will not trade land for peace, as Palestinians and the United Nations demand.The Evening Sun wants to know if you think the United States should maintain pressure on Israel to stay at the peace table and to negotiate until a plan has been reached.Call SUNDIAL, the Baltimore Sun's telephone information system, on a Touch-Tone phone. The call is local, and answers will be registered between 10 a.m. and midnight.

The Soviet-American invitations to a Middle East peace conference in Madrid on Oct. 30 is a triumph for the brilliant, tactful, dogged and tireless diplomacy of Secretary of State James A. Baker III. To bring all parties this far, he achieved the improbable. From here on, it gets more difficult.There was sufficient Israeli trust in American tentative approval of a last-minute Palestinian list of delegates to allow Israeli-Soviet diplomatic relations to be resuscitated. This was needed for Israeli acceptance of a Soviet-sponsored invitation.

JERUSALEM -- Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, rejecting past Israeli claims to the West Bank and other occupied Arab territories, is calling on his countrymen to abandon the concept of a "Greater Land of Israel" and to give up that land for peace with their Arab neighbors.In one of his strongest appeals for withdrawing from occupied Arab territory, Mr. Rabin told Israelis that they simply could not hope to control all of biblical Israel and that trying to do so would put the Jewish state at risk.

Nothing illustrated Israel's breakout from isolation by the Arab world better than what happened the day after Israel and the PLO signed agreements to recognize each other. Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin stopped off to see King Hassan of Morocco. Israel and Jordan signed an agenda for negotiations, which is the equivalent of the agreement on principles with the PLO.As a breakthrough, each of these is more apparent than real. Morocco tacitly accepted Israel for years. The king met foreign minister (former prime minister)

Benjamin Netanyahu's probable election victory did not surprise members of the local Jewish community as much as it set them thinking about peace and tolerance."

JERUSALEM -- Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu promised yesterday to resume negotiations with Arabs, but said talks with the Palestinians would depend on an end to terrorism.In doing so, he appeared to be holding the Palestinian authority, and its president, Yasser Arafat, responsible for terrorist acts by radical Islamic groups."It's either terrorism or peace, but you cannot have both," he said after meeting here with Secretary of State Warren Christopher.In Netanyahu's first news conference since his May 29 election, he repeated his pledge to pursue peace and continued his silence on how the negotiations will overcome his own opposition to the progress made by the previous Israeli government.

Benjamin Netanyahu's probable election victory did not surprise members of the local Jewish community as much as it set them thinking about peace and tolerance."

WHEN Yasser Arafat clasped hands with Yitzhak Rabin on the White House lawn last September, the handshake was treated as a turning point, like the fall of the Berlin Wall. Peace was finally breaking out in the Middle East, said a thousand commentators.They were wrong. We are not witnessing a change of heart by the Arabs -- a willingness to share the land of Palestine with Jews -- but rather a change of heart on the part of Israelis.First, some terminology. This is not a "peace process"; this is a unilateral withdrawal by Israel.

Nothing illustrated Israel's breakout from isolation by the Arab world better than what happened the day after Israel and the PLO signed agreements to recognize each other. Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin stopped off to see King Hassan of Morocco. Israel and Jordan signed an agenda for negotiations, which is the equivalent of the agreement on principles with the PLO.As a breakthrough, each of these is more apparent than real. Morocco tacitly accepted Israel for years. The king met foreign minister (former prime minister)

KATZRIN, Israeli-occupied Golan Heights -- For the first time since a Syrian shell blew off Ehud Margalith's left leg in 1973, he is contemplating retreat from the Golan Heights.He is no more happy about it now than he was then, when Israelis had to win back the plateau in close, bloody combat after the surprise attack by Syrians in what Israelis came to call the Yom Kippur War."We cannot give up the Golan," says Mr. Margalith, a soldier in1973 and now an accountant in Katzrin, the largest town on the Heights.

JERUSALEM -- Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, rejecting past Israeli claims to the West Bank and other occupied Arab territories, is calling on his countrymen to abandon the concept of a "Greater Land of Israel" and to give up that land for peace with their Arab neighbors.In one of his strongest appeals for withdrawing from occupied Arab territory, Mr. Rabin told Israelis that they simply could not hope to control all of biblical Israel and that trying to do so would put the Jewish state at risk.

The meeting of Arabs and Israelis in Madrid next Wednesday will symbolize what they share as much as what separates them.Spain is gearing up to celebrate next year the 500th anniversary of more than Columbus' discovery of America for Ferdinand of Aragon and Isabella of Castile. It is also the 500th anniversary of their conquest of Granada, the last Arab kingdom on the Iberian peninsula, which unified Spain. And it is equally the 500th anniversary of their expulsion of the Jews, which established Spain's character as a militantly Catholic superstate.

JERUSALEM -- Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu promised yesterday to resume negotiations with Arabs, but said talks with the Palestinians would depend on an end to terrorism.In doing so, he appeared to be holding the Palestinian authority, and its president, Yasser Arafat, responsible for terrorist acts by radical Islamic groups."It's either terrorism or peace, but you cannot have both," he said after meeting here with Secretary of State Warren Christopher.In Netanyahu's first news conference since his May 29 election, he repeated his pledge to pursue peace and continued his silence on how the negotiations will overcome his own opposition to the progress made by the previous Israeli government.

Don't blame Israel or worldwide Jewry if the ''land for peace''slogan evokes only sardonic laughter. The Zionist movement has been surrendering land since early in the century, and peace has never been the result.Palestine, the land upon which Israel was settled, is now regarded as being located west of the Jordan River. In fact, until the end of World War I, historic Palestine was not only the West Bank but all or most of what is now the Kingdom of Jordan.Hence, when Lord Balfour's famous declaration was issued in 1917 -- ''His Majesty's government views with favor the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish People . . .'' -- he meant the Palestine as defined at that time.

SECRETARY of State James Baker, the architect of the Arab-Israeli peace talks, hopes to lay a foundation for lasting peace. Instead, he may be drawing the participants into a diplomatic house of cards.Certainly, the Madrid talks are an important breakthrough: They bring together Israel and three of its longtime enemies -- Jordan, Lebanon and Syria -- for face-to-face talks for the first time since the creation of Israel in 1948.However, that achievement is likely to lead to a diplomatic dead end, for there is no evidence that any of the participants are willing to make the compromises necessary for a negotiated settlement.