* * *
Upstaged by Sadat as a great peacemaker, Jimmy Carter was now faced with the problem of maintaining a leading role if the United States was to keep its leverage in shaping a new order in the Middle East. Kissinger had demonstrated that nothing would be accomplished by the two avowed enemies in Cairo and Jerusalem without American leadership and pressure. This was confirmed by the period of almost a year’s drift that followed Sadat’s visit to Jerusalem. It fell to Carter to gain Begin’s confidence and trust. But Begin not only was an ideologue for a Greater Israel, he maintained all the defenses of a gentleman lawyer including a legalistic mind-set—the exact opposite of the expansive politics practiced by Sadat. American gestures or concessions did not moderate his position, and compromise was made even more difficult by Israeli pressure that was exerted through American Jewish leaders. I explained to Carter that American Jews’ nervousness about our Middle East policy was rooted in the bitter memory of American inaction while millions of European Jews were murdered during World War II, and he made it clear that he understood. But it was also difficult for American Jews to understand Carter’s strategy of enhancing Israel’s security by trying to build bridges to moderate Arabs and the Palestinians. That concept seemed an oxymoron in the American heartland.
Nevertheless the president swallowed hard and praised Sadat’s trip as “great and courageous” at a breakfast with Democratic congressional leaders shortly after Sadat returned home. But he quickly followed by saying it would be “good to see how Sadat and Begin do by themselves for the next few weeks.”35 He obviously did not expect to see much and blamed the impasse mainly on Israeli settlements—not only in the West Bank but in the Sinai, where conquest had given Israel strategic depth to throw back any Arab attack.
In fact, little was accomplished in meetings between the two countries, but the reasons are more complicated. As Carter had urged in his letters to Begin and Sadat, Egypt and Israel attempted to settle their differences by themselves. The president stood aside uncomfortably as high-ranking officials began gathering for the first direct negotiations between the two neighboring nations, on the outskirts of Cairo at the fabled Mena House hotel, within site of the Pyramids. But the sense of excitement and even wonder at the new beginning was felt even in the city’s teeming bazaars. A member of the Egyptian delegation, Abdel Raouf El Reedy, remembered that it had captured “the eyes and the attention of the Egyptian people that you had an Israeli delegation, Israelis in town, moving around everywhere.”36 An Israeli member was late because when he went shopping in old Cairo people showered his party with candy, offered tea and coffee, and even refused payment in the shops.
But all this was bound to lead to disappointment because a principal source of the popular outpouring of joy was the expectation of getting the Sinai back, and the Palestinian problem being resolved once and for all. Few knew that the PLO’s Arafat declined Sadat’s invitation to participate, because he refused to accept UN Resolution 242 as a condition of joining the talks. Israel had already prepared a peace treaty under Dayan’s direction, but there was no hint in the draft of Israeli withdrawal from the Sinai.37
The two sides negotiated day and night from December 13 to Christmas Day at the Mena House in rooms with poorly disguised listening devices planted by the Egyptians. Defense Minister Weizman arrived secretly in Cairo for negotiations, but when he had to telephone Israel, his call had to be routed through New York, because there was no direct communication with Jerusalem. The hotel flew the PLO flag prominently, and the Israelis warned that they would leave if it was not taken down; the Egyptians said the flag was there only for a photo and then it would be removed. The Egyptians tried linking the talks to the Palestinians, but the Israelis would not hear of it. The Israeli delegation meanwhile said they were not empowered to set a date for withdrawing from the Sinai. The hard work was fruitless.38
The meeting nevertheless drew such favorable press coverage and congressional reaction that the Carter administration could not be seen as opposing it.39 Now the onus was on Begin to respond positively to Sadat’s opening. But even before the Mena House talks got under way, Begin had written out by hand sixteen articles of a proposed treaty and instructed Aharon Barak, his Foreign Office legal adviser, to “dress it [up] in legal terms.”40 Israel would offer to withdraw from the Egyptian Sinai in two stages; it would also grant home rule to Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza as long as Israel remained in charge of security for five years, with a review at that time. Sidestepping Sadat and the Mena House talks, he wanted to take it to Carter in person.
Carter was coming to realize that the Egyptians and Israelis were incapable of making peace without active American engagement, because their opposing positions were so deeply entrenched. While Begin’s proposal for some Palestinian self-government was only a first step, the very fact that he made it was regarded as significant. The prime minister’s own tactics supported Carter’s reading of America’s essential role as mediator and guarantor of any agreement. He wanted to show his autonomy plan to Carter before showing it to Sadat, and did not even vet it with most of his cabinet before going to Washington just after the Mena talks had begun.
Carter and Brzezinski liked most of Begin’s plan for withdrawing from most of Sinai.41 But they rejected his plan for Palestinian autonomy, feeling it was “a step in the right direction,” but inadequate, and Carter warned that it might bring down Sadat. But all in all, Carter appreciated “the flexibility and political courage and was a major reason why I came to believe that I could have a fruitful meeting involving just Begin, Sadat, and me.”42 Brzezinski carefully discussed Begin’s proposals with Mondale and me. I was deputed to set up a private meeting between Begin and Brzezinski to discuss details. So I arranged the meeting through Ambassador Dinitz at Blair House. Brzezinski first suggested that Begin adjust the wording by dropping the formal term “autonomy”—which he felt was usually used for a district or region of one’s own country—and substituting the more flexible term “self-rule.” Begin readily agreed. They then discussed other details to ready the plan for formal presentation to the president in the Cabinet Room.43
When Begin came to Washington in mid-December, he gave a bravado performance. In the marginal notes on my yellow pad I wrote: “Begin did almost all the talking. Had maps. Seemed clearly pleased with this forthcoming position.” He spoke extemporaneously and without a stop for almost half an hour; included was his almost mandatory dissertation on Jewish history, from the link between the Jewish people and the land of Israel to the Holocaust and the rebirth of the Jewish state. I could see a good deal of fidgeting on the American side of the table, but Carter never once showed the impatience he clearly felt, as Begin inched toward the heart of his proposal. It included a withdrawal from Sinai in three to four years, with a UN force which could not be removed without approval of all the parties (today a multinational force is still there).
For the West Bank, he proposed the creation of a civilian Arab council with continued Israeli military control in military encampments, and leaving open a decision on sovereignty.44 This was not a bad starting point, but would end up being the high-water mark in loosening Israel’s hold over the territories conquered by Israel in the Six-Day War, which Begin became the first Israeli prime minister to always call by their biblical names of Judea and Samaria. It did set the stage for a Camp David accord with Egypt after innumerable twists and turns. Unfortunately, some of those turns were taken by Begin himself as he put forward ideas, dangled them, and then pulled back.
BEGIN AND SADAT FAIL TO MAKE PEACE ALONE
Shortly after the White House meetings, Begin and Sadat met in Ismailia on December 27. Sadat drove Begin around the Suez Canal Zone to show him the territory. Begin began by lecturing Sadat that the “Arabs and Egypt had been defeated in an aggressive war [and when] people lose wars they lost also territory. My experience in Eastern Europe tells me so.” Sadat was taken aback: “I have to remind you, Mr. Prime Minister, that [k
ind of thinking] led to many, many, many wars, because every time you take territory from this party, the aggrieved party would decide to take back its territory. So if that is your will or wish, then it is strange that we are sitting to discuss this.”45 Not surprisingly, the autonomy plan Begin presented to Sadat was not as liberal as the one he had given to Carter; hawks in the Israeli cabinet argued that it would eventually lead to a Palestinian state. Ismailia, Ambassador Lewis believed, was the beginning of Sadat’s ill will toward Begin and “a great missed opportunity.” Sadat wanted a general statement of principles to show that he had obtained enough for the Palestinians to defend his negotiations to the Arab world, before his fellow Arabs became too negative and tried to block a deal returning the Sinai to Egypt.46
Begin asked to meet Sadat privately, and after twenty minutes alone together, Begin announced they had reached a written agreement on a formula for Palestinian autonomy, which in fact Begin had prepared in advance. “Well, please read it,” said Sadat. “No, I prefer you read it,” said Begin, and Sadat did so, demonstrating how far he was from his own delegation, which was already deeply suspicious of the entire initiative. And when Sadat read it out in a way that indicated he was close to agreeing, Boutros-Ghali immediately declared: “This statement is unacceptable.” Everyone on the Israeli side was shocked at this outburst, but it clearly reflected the views of Sadat’s senior Egyptian advisers, who were trying to protect their bold leader from himself.47
To the Egyptians, Boutros-Ghali wrote, Begin’s “vision involved a kind of amputated Palestinian entity.”48 Even Mondale, when he learned of Begin’s autonomy plan, remarked, “You couldn’t even sell that to people in Washington, D.C., (where the residents sought home rule).”49 And in the end, nothing was agreed. Neither side could reach across to the other to understand his opponent’s thinking, and certainly not the pressures against compromise faced by both sides. My own experience in negotiating domestic and international agreements is that it is just as important to know your opposition’s problems and bottom lines as it is to know your own. Begin never incorporated Sadat’s severe public exposure to Arab intransigence into his own thinking, and Sadat, perhaps feeling he could do better with U.S. pressure on Israel, felt he could overcome them by force of personality and personal vision, without fully recognizing Begin’s redlines.50
Military and political committees were created and met in January, but nothing materialized. As the Middle East drifted, Ham became concerned that Carter was spreading himself too thin and not investing enough of his resources in his domestic priorities. In a 116-page memo summing up Carter’s first year in office, his strongest warning was based in part on the bruising first year of Middle East diplomacy: “Foreign policy and domestic issues bring conflicting political pressures on a President … [which] must be continually reconciled.” He cited the surveys of Carter’s pollster, Pat Caddell, showing that the American people’s primary concerns were far from the Middle East—jobs, inflation, and the general condition of the economy.
Ham warned: “The amount of time spent on foreign policy in the last ten months left less time than you needed to deal with domestic issues and maintain an effective political base.” In a sharp criticism of the president’s lack of priorities, the man who had engineered Carter’s election told him as only he could, “You find it difficult—if not impossible—to say that ‘this problem is not important enough to merit my personal attention.’ As a result, too many policies, programs and issues receive what I describe as excessive Presidential attention and absorb too much of the precious political and moral capital of your Presidency.”51
The memo had some impact. Ham was later named Carter’s first White House chief of staff. Working with me, Brezinski, and our staffs, Mondale was put in charge of what became an effective effort to set strict presidential priorities on issues that demanded Carter’s attention, and the rest, which could be handled with White House staff oversight, or by the cabinet members themselves. But one thing that did not change was the extraordinary amount of time and energy Carter devoted to the Middle East, and his willingness to stake out positions that opposed Israeli policies.
Just after the New Year, Carter was off to the Middle East. On January 3 he flew to Saudi Arabia to meet with Crown Prince Fahd to discuss a Palestinian homeland. The following day he arrived in Aswan in Upper Egypt to meet Sadat, only a few days after the Begin-Sadat meeting at Ismailia. In fact Sadat initially praised Begin for a concrete proposal for withdrawal from the occupied territories. But after he met with Carter at Aswan on January 4, the Egyptian press took a hard line, describing Begin as intransigent. Sadat canceled the meetings of the joint Egyptian-Israeli committee that had made considerable progress. Did Sadat believe Carter’s pressure on Begin would produce a more favorable outcome? Carter assured Sadat at Aswan that he “agreed with the Arab position that Israel ought to withdraw completely from the occupied territories, with minor adjustments in the western part: that there should be self-determination of the Palestinians short of an independent nation; and genuine peaceful relations between Israel and each of her neighbors.”52
IT’S THE SETTLEMENTS, STUPID
On January 10 Carter sent Begin a strong message criticizing settlement expansion in the West Bank as “an obstacle to peace.”53 None of this had much effect on Begin or his aggressive new political partner, the military hero Ariel Sharon, who pressed ahead with new settlements, nominally as Begin’s agriculture minister. Carter recognized that any progress would require a significant push from Washington and a U.S. plan. Sadat was invited to Camp David to develop a plan under an American strategy in which he would put forward one that would be unacceptable to the Israelis, and then have the United States moderate it with compromise proposals.54
Sadat arrived at Camp David on February 4 with his wife, Jehan, one of the very few occasions that a foreign leader had been invited to the president’s retreat. Rosalynn Carter took a snowmobile ride with Sadat, while her husband rode on another with Sadat’s wife, Jehan.55 This was a bonding experience, and it would pay off because Sadat gave the president wide latitude to negotiate with Israel. As Carter noted, in his historic trip to Jerusalem, Sadat had “decided in one fell swoop to accomplish all these Israeli desires and get the U.S. Jew lobby (as he referred to it) off my shoulders. They were not ready for peace and possibly are still not.” Carter felt that Sadat was “completely disillusioned with Begin’s ridiculous position” at Ismailia of wanting to hold on to settlements in the Sinai.56
Sadat warned him that he was going to announce at his National Press Club speech on Monday that Egypt was discontinuing military and political talks; it took every bit of presidential persuasion to get him to back off his threat.57 This would not be the last time a personal intervention by Carter was necessary to keep Sadat from bolting.
The Israelis also realized they might be forced into a corner. While Carter and Sadat were meeting, Dinitz came to my office and I upbraided him about the new settlements. In a top-secret cable to Dayan I saw years later, Dinitz claimed there was a “hideous campaign” against Israel to “undermine our credibility, by leaks and interpretations directed from above, with the intention to create the impression as though we broke our promise to the President.”58
The tone of Sadat’s visit stood in sharp contrast to the abrasive encounters with Begin. Part was personality. Sadat had a charm, ebullience, and warmth that contrasted sharply with Begin’s demeanor. While Begin could be a pedantic lecturer, Sadat spoke in broad generalities, with a sweeping vision and disdain for details, and endeared himself to Carter, calling him “my friend Jimmy.” Begin of course had the most to lose in terms of territory and security, so every concession was made grudgingly, while Sadat counted on Carter to protect his interests as long as Egypt regained all of the Sinai and was able to obtain something for the Palestinians. As the months wore on and the administration began preparing for a visit by Begin late in March, the tension heightened, with Sadat angry that B
egin had not adequately responded to his grand gesture,59 and Carter piloting a highly controversial bill through Congress permitting the sale of American fighter jets to Egypt and Saudi Arabia. Caught in the crossfire, Carter blurted out to congressional leaders the day before Begin’s arrival that he expected the visit to be “unpleasant” and lamented that “peace hopes have faded.”60
With all this in mind, the United States and Israel began preparing for a March meeting with Begin. When Dinitz came to my office, I had a harsh message to deliver from Brzezinski, warning that Israel’s expansionist policies were untenable.61 He got the message and cabled home quoting Brzezinski—in capital letters—as warning that “ISRAEL SHOULD NOT BE ALLOWED TO GET AWAY WITH IT.” Carter, I said, recommended that Begin start using the term “withdrawal to military encampments” to help Carter sell Sadat on the idea that Israel was showing some flexibility, and Begin eventually accepted this formulation. But the core of the problem was the civilian settlements themselves. To drive home the political danger, I said that Israel’s opponents in the administration and even in the White House had fixed on the settlements to “arouse public opinion against you [even among Jews], and to weaken your position in the Congress and in the public.” As a friend of Israel, I pleaded with Dinitz to urge Begin not to give ammunition to his opponents. I knew I could not change Begin’s long-held views about Israel’s right to settle in what he called Judaea and Samaria, but I implored Dinitz to strongly recommend that Begin not exercise that right for the time being so that negotiations with Egypt might succeed. I also urged that Begin reach out to Jordan, which he did, but he did not absorb our basic message.62
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