Middle East: Split over Summitry

A little over two years ago, Egypt’s Gamal Abdel Nasser convened the Arab world’s first summit conference in Cairo, and managed to build a façade of “Arab Unity” against the common Israeli enemy. In a swirl of fellowship and flowing robes, Arab Kings and Presidents embraced as brothers, organized the Palestine Liberation Organization, set up a joint Arab military command, and created a committee to plan the diversion of Jordan River headwaters flowing into Israel’s Sea of Galilee. The façade has been crumbling almost ever since, and last week with the approach of the fourth such summit, scheduled for Algiers on Sept. 5, it had all but collapsed. Nasser, joined by his Arab Socialist allies, was demanding an end of summitry “until we can be assured things will go right.” Saudi Arabia’s King Feisal was demanding that the summit go on as scheduled—with or without Nasser.

The split over the summit was symbolic of everything wrong with so-called Arab unity. Four years ago, Nasser and Feisal took different sides in the war in Yemen, a microcosm of the far larger struggle between the Socialist and conservative forces in the Middle East. By early this year, Feisal was talking up the possibility of an “Islamic” summit meeting next March that would theoretically include all Moslems, but clearly had the aim of rallying anti-Nasser leaders into a single alliance. So far, Feisal has strong support from non-Arab but strongly Moslem Iran, as well as Tunisia; he also enjoys sympathy from Jordan, Morocco and Kuwait. This month the King plans to visit Turkey’s Premier Suleyman Demirel and, in September, Morocco’s King Hassan II and possibly Tunisia’s President Habib Bourguiba.

Second Highest. Nervous at Feisal’s maneuvering, Nasser decided that it was time to grab back the initiative. In an angry broadcast three weeks ago, Egypt’s leader called for an “indefinite postponement” of the Algiers summit, declaring: “We cannot sit side by side with reactionary elements.” That seemed to kill any chance of a summit. Then last week, Feisal announced that Saudi Arabia would not go along with postponement. “More than ever before,” said Feisal, “there is dire necessity for Arab summit conferences, in order to unify the Arab effort.” Moreover, said Feisal, his country, which is the Middle East’s second highest contributor ($22.4 million) to Arab summit organizations, would refuse further payments unless the meeting were held. In the end, only Jordan rallied to Feisal’s side, and the Arab League had no choice but to postpone the meeting. Undaunted, Feisal began pressing even harder for his Islamic summit next spring. “Perhaps,” sighed one Saudi Cabinet member, “Allah will succeed where Arabs have failed.”