The Most Dangerous Arena

I think the Middle East now is terribly dangerous, like the Balkans before World War I. The two superpowers, the U.S. and the Soviet Union, could be drawn into a confrontation that neither of them wants because of the differences there.

Toward the end of his hour-long TV discussion last week, President Nixon turned from the Far East to an area that he described as "more dangerous than Viet Nam." That appraisal is hard to fault. Unless Israel and its Arab neighbors reach some accommodation before long, an all-out war may very well break out in the region. If that happens, the superpowers might become participants instead of mere sponsors.

Sweet Words. To head off just such an explosive possibility, Secretary of State William Rogers two weeks ago approached the principals directly with a new set of U.S. peace proposals. The details reportedly include at least a 90-day ceasefire, Israeli withdrawal at some point from occupied territories, and Arab acceptance of Israel's right to exist within recognized borders. To give his proposals time to germinate among the Arabs, Rogers pressed Israel not to respond to them peremptorily.

That the Israeli government disliked the proposals quickly became apparent. In front of her Cabinet, Premier Golda Meir harshly criticized Foreign Minister Abba Eban for his overly optimistic evaluation of Washington's proposals. She also wrote a private note to President Nixon. Said an aide to the Premier: "Nixon gives us sweet words, and Rogers stabs us in the back."

Mrs. Meir, wearing a new turquoise midi that was far brighter than her mood, delivered a 30-minute foreign policy speech to the Knesset that sounded like a subtle no to Washington's plan. A temporary ceasefire, Mrs. Meir said, would only permit the Arabs to "prepare for the renewal of the war in a more intense form." Her point was underscored when Soviet-made SA-2 missiles near the Suez Canal brought down a Phantom jet and an Israeli Skyhawk within half an hour of each other. The planes were the only ones to be destroyed by SA-2s since the Six-Day War other than a lone Piper Cub. The fact that Russia has apparently developed mobile platforms for the missiles, enabling Egypt to shift and hide them in an area that has been subjected to 25 consecutive days of bombing, convinced Israel that a temporary truce would be militarily devastating.

Still, Mrs. Meir's Knesset speech was not a definite rejection. Nor have Israel's opponents thus far rejected Rogers' proposals. Egypt's President Gamal Abdel Nasser, who arrived in Moscow for a week-long official visit, met three times with Soviet Communist Boss Leonid Brezhnev and Premier Aleksei Kosygin, principally to discuss the U.S. overture. At the United Nations, Russian Ambassador Yakov Malik indicated that Moscow might be amenable to something less than complete Israeli withdrawal. Russia's Ambassador to Washington, Anatoly Dobrynin, made the same point six weeks ago in the private discussions he has been having with Assistant Secretary of State Joseph Sisco. Dobrynin and Sisco conferred last week, as did Sisco and Israeli Ambassador Rabin.

No Interest. One important group that has shown no interest in Rogers' proposals is the Arab guerrillas, who reject any settlement that does not provide specifically for their return to Palestine. In the wake of last month's fighting between the guerrillas and the Jordanian army, King Hussein has installed a new, heavily pro-fedayeen Cabinet and called on his subjects to "prepare for the battle of liberation."

Despite the tough stance, Hussein has always been the leading Arab moderate. Last week Golda Meir noted that surreptitious face-to-face peace talks had been held between Israelis and Arabs. "Suppose we met five times with so-arid-so," she teased, "but his condition for meeting with us was that the meeting be kept secret?" When newsmen inquired who "so-and-so" might be, the Premier responded with a Gioconda smile. The best guess was that she meant Hussein, who is known to have met secretly on occasion with Abba Eban.

What happens next in the diplomatic game is uncertain. Nixon took a strongly pro-Israel position in his television appearance, which upset Arabs. Even so, Washington is still hopeful, and is being extremely careful to keep things calm. Thus, in response to newsmen's questions, White House Press Secretary Ronald Ziegler said that even if the Soviet buildup in Egypt continued, "we have no plans to inject U.S. military personnel into the area."

The tip-off of a break in the deadlock would be the dispatch to the Middle East of Gunnar Jarring, Sweden's Ambassador to Moscow, to resume the intermediary's role he undertook unsuccessfully more than two years ago. Jarring might fail again, but the alternative to making an effort, as President Nixon indicated last week, could be a disaster.

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