World: Two Voices in Opposition

Leaders of Israel’s Labor opposition are now beginning to speak out against Menachem Begin’s handling of the peace negotiations. Among the most eloquent are former Premier Yitzhak Rabin and former Foreign Minister Abba Eban. In interviews with TIME Jerusalem Bureau Chief Donald Neff and Correspondent David Halevy, they explained their views:

Rabin: “These Tricks Are So Stupid”

“The government of Israel,” says Yitzhak Rabin, “has made too many mistakes, more than we can afford. The first mistake was in the method of negotiating with an Arab leader. One must make absolutely sure there is no misunderstanding, especially in private talks. Begin said Sadat promised that Egyptian forces would not move east of the Sinai passes. Later Begin admitted that this was in the context of Israeli forces withdrawing to the international border and the return of sovereignty over all the Sinai to Egypt. Still later it became clear that questions such as settlements and Israeli airbases were not mentioned by either leader in the private talks.

“The second mistake was in the nature of the negotiations. Begin went in the wrong direction by asking for more [settlements and airbases] instead of making concessions. This is not the way to negotiate.”

The third mistake, continues Rabin, was in the process of the negotiations. “Every Israeli Premier since Ben-Gurion used to say that once an Arab leader would meet openly with the Premier of Israel, the conflict could be solved within minutes. Well, President Sadat came, sat, talked, and yet the miracle that was called direct negotiations did not work. But more than that, Begin decided to go to Washington to get President Carter’s blessing for his peace plan even before he showed it to the Egyptians; this displayed Begin’s obvious lack of confidence in direct negotiations. Now we have practically returned to a process of negotiations that is conducted through the good offices of the U.S.

“Another major mistake was to start new settlements after Sadat’s visit had opened the chance for peace. The government started what I call ghost settlements in Sinai—13, 15, 20, who knows? Does this help the cause of peace? Is this the time to start new settlements, when for the first time you are talking directly to the President of Egypt? This is the first Israeli government that agreed to limit settlements to military camps. But then to build a military camp where you want a settlement and describe that as a new settlement within an existing military camp —no one can buy that here, so why should anyone outside buy it? And then the shameful subterfuge at the so-called archaeological site at Shiloh. I’m ashamed that an Israeli government can act this way. It creates such a lack of confidence in the government; these tricks are so stupid.”

Finally, Rabin accuses both sides of turning serious negotiations into show-business competition on television: “Sadat and Begin remind me of the musical Annie Get Your Gun—anything you can do I can do better. It’s a competition to see who will have more time on the American networks and space in the magazines and newspapers. Sometimes I ask myself, are they really serious, or is this a competition between actors?”

Rabin is convinced that both men want peace, but that each wants it on his own terms. “I don’t accuse Begin of any wrong intentions,” Rabin says, “but his methods do not encourage the peace process. Yet ultimately I am optimistic because Begin would not like to go down in Jewish history as the man who had a unique opportunity to achieve peace and failed.”

Eban: “You Cannot Have Peace Without Risks”

Unlike most of Begin’s critics, Abba Eban believes that the Premier was right to concede sovereignty over the Sinai to Egypt from the beginning. But he thinks it absurd for the Israeli government to insist, at the same time, on retaining control over the Israeli civilian settlements there. “The Israeli government,” Eban says, “should not harbor the illusion that you can have Israeli civilian settlements under Egyptian sovereignty. It is a strange development of Zionism to take Jews out of Israel and put them in Egypt, reversing the direction of the Exodus. The settlers would become a permanent source of friction between the two governments. Areas of obscure sovereignty, like Danzig, are usually associated with tension.”

If the areas where the settlements are located are deemed to be vital for Israel’s security, it would be far better, Eban argues, to exchange some territories: a small part of Israel’s Negev desert in return for a small part of the Sinai. In any case, Eban is skeptical about the security value of civilian settlements. “In the day of tank warfare, 50 machine guns or 100 rifles mean nothing.”

As for the new “archaeological” settlement at Shiloh in the West Bank, Eban has little patience with either the government’s subterfuge or its timing. “If the site where the ark of the covenant was stationed has been forgotten for 3,400 years,” he reasons, “let’s give it another year.”

In essence, says Eban, Begin is seeking a peace treaty with Egypt and an interim agreement on the Palestinian issue. “There is nothing wrong with that, since a definitive agreement on Palestine is probably not possible in 1978. The fact that we and the Arabs do not agree on the final destination should not prevent us from going some distance together.”

Nor does Eban see anything wrong with “autonomy” as a goal for the Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza, since the word is ambiguous enough to accommodate the aims of both the Israelis and the Palestinians. “Let each side dream its dreams, and we shall see in a few years who is right and who is wrong. It will be up to the Palestinian Arabs to dispel our fears that any separation [of the West Bank from Israel] would be hostile to our security. I assume the Israeli government knows that autonomy carries certain risks, and that it will not stop there but develop further. But you cannot have peace without risks.”

Eban is not overly worried about Sadat’s present demands, since he is convinced that even Sadat does not believe in “100% restoration of Arab land.” Eban maintains that Sadat obviously does not expect the Israelis to surrender the Wailing Wall, that holiest of Jewish shrines, to Arab sovereignty. So if there is one exception, he reasons, there can also be others. Eban’s advice to Sadat: “He should remember the proverb ‘The best is the enemy of the good.’ Those who say ‘All or nothing’ are more likely to get nothing than all.”