Middle East: Sense Amid the Shambles

Of all the territories seized by the Israelis during the six-day war, the one that lends itself most to negotiation is Jordan’s West Bank. The vast majority of its 900,000 Arabs remained there instead of fleeing, and the land they live on is fertile enough to support them. Moreover, many among them are not only capable of, but desirous of, coming to terms with Israel. Since the West Bank was part of Palestine for much longer than it has been part of Jordan, its people have neither a deep loyalty to the Hashemite kingdom of Jordan nor a consuming hatred of Israel.

Until the war, their cause and that of the other Palestinian Arabs scattered through the Middle East had been led by Ahmed Shukairy, the leftist, demagogic boss of the Palestine Liberation Organization. But Shukairy, who fled from the front even before the first shots were fired, was so thoroughly discredited that Palestinians no longer want anything to do with him, and the Arab states have cut off the P.L.O.’s $15 million yearly subsidy. Shukairy’s fall created a vacuum of leadership, which is now being filled by West Bank Arabs who hope to get the best deal they can from Israel.

Call for Peace. The new leaders are the mayors and politicians who remained in their posts when the Israelis marched in. Where Shukairy had been fanatic, they are pragmatic. Where Shukairy had depended on other Arab states to “drive the Israelis into the sea,” the new men call for a purely “Palestine initiative”—the essence of which is to make an acceptable peace with Israel. “The Israelis have all along offered the Arab states peace,” says Aziz Shihadeh, 50, a lawyer in the occupied town of Ramallah. “They have been offering it to the wrong people. We, the Palestinians, are the only ones who can negotiate.”

Most active of the new pragmatists is Sheik Mohammed Ali Ja’abari, 60, the mayor of the ancient city of Hebron in the hills southwest of Jeru salem. A former Minister of Justice under Jordan’s King Hussein, Ja’abari has spent the past two weeks trying to organize a conference of prominent Palestinians to determine just what form peace negotiations should take, and what they should lead to. His compatriots still disagree about whether to hold out for full independence, try to become part of Jordan again or accept Israeli citizenship in return for full local autonomy and Israeli economic aid. No date has yet been set for the conference, but Ja’abari expects it to appoint an Arab Palestinian to begin negotiations with the Israeli authorities.

Fresh Fish. In part, the new pragmatism stems from desperation: Palestinians no longer believe that the Jews can be driven out of Israel. But it also reflects the indisputable fact that life under the Israelis has not been as harsh as most Palestinians had feared. Money and private cars have been in short supply since the war, and the West Bank telephone system, sabotaged by the departing Jordanians, is still a shambles. But food is plentiful, including the fresh sea fish that Palestinians love and the Jordanians were unable to supply. More important, there have been no mass repressions, no raping of Arab women, no wholesale expropriations of Arab property. Palestinian businessmen have shucked their coats and ties, adopted the more comfortable Israeli practice of coming to work in their shirtsleeves. “From the very first day,” says Bethlehem’s Mayor Elias Bandak, “the Israelis and our people mixed together as old friends.”

That may be something of an overstatement. In Hebron, Mayor Ja’abari’s calls for negotiations have brought him a flood of threatening letters, the derision of Jordan’s Amman radio and an attempt to blow up his house. But neither Ja’abari nor his colleagues give much importance to the violence of their critics. “I am not afraid,” Ja’abari says. “I believe the great majority of the Palestine people want a solution, so they can live in peace. We are tired of war. We want better days for our children.” All that keeps many Palestinians from openly working with the Israelis toward that end, in fact, is uncertainty over just what will finally become of the West Bank. Afraid to cooperate too actively with the Israelis lest they be called collaborators if Jordan regains the land, they may need only a firm declaration of Israel’s intentions to make them all as pragmatic as their leaders.