You Have to Level with Begin"

While serving as Jimmy Carter's special Middle East ambassador in 1979-80, Sol Linowitz spent countless hours trying to fathom the complex personality of Menachem Begin. As President Reagan prepared to confront Begin on the invasion of Lebanon, TIME asked Linowitz for his views on dealing with the Israeli Prime Minister:

Begin is a man of many moods, with a wide swing of emotions. He can be very gentle, quiet, sentimental. Yet he can also act like a thundering prophet out of the Old Testament. He is a man who walks in his own history. His family was wiped out in the Holocaust, and that hangs over everything he thinks about.

Nothing bewilders him more than to get conflicting signals. Time and again we have assured him of our commitment to Israel's security. Then he hears that we are planning to supply AWACS [airborne warning and control systems] to Saudi Arabia and arms to Jordan. He does not know how to relate this to what he thinks is our understanding of him.

Begin loves to argue. He is a lawyer and proud of it. He is very careful about every word, so precise about every nuance of the language. You have to be as careful as he is. He has a fantastic memory, so he remembers what you have said.

I believe Begin prides himself on being a man of his word, on doing what he says he is going to do. He takes very badly the allegation that he does not abide by his commitments. That is important in understanding Begin as a proud leader who speaks with great determination, with the feeling that he knows the right course for the future and that he is trying to find peace in the midst of warlike neighbors.

A hardline, get-tough attitude is not the way to move Begin. He will become even more adamant about his assertions if he feels that threats are being used and pressure applied in order to get him to give way. If we take that approach, he may become more intractable, and, what is more, the Israeli nation may rally around him with a passion.

Begin believes in telling us bluntly what he expects of us, so it is vitally important that we level with him if we are going to deal with him effectively. We don't do that. We skirt that kind of directness. We go through curious steps, such as suggesting that the President will not meet with him because we are dissatisfied about what he may be doing in Beirut. There is the perception on his part that we lack forthrightness in dealing with him.

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