Inching Closer to Peace

Once again the Middle East approaches a dangerous deadline. The latest ceasefire between Egypt and Israel ends at midnight next Sunday. With an eye on the calendar, and with an aim toward keeping negotiations going, Israel last week presented United Nations Mediator Gunnar Jarring with its response to Egypt's recent peace proposals. The Israelis welcomed Cairo's apparent willingness to conclude a "peace agreement" of some sort, and stated their willingness to pull back to "secure and agreed boundaries." At the same time, however, Israel re-emphasized that it does not intend to give up all the territory captured in the 1967 war.

Eventually, the crucial question will come to this: exactly how much territory does Israel intend to surrender? Arab negotiators say, largely for public consumption, that every acre must be returned. On the other hand, Israel's Premier Golda Meir drew some pretty specific lines during a women's Zionist meeting in Tel Aviv last week, indicating that her country aims to retain some key areas. "The Americans know very well how much we can concede," said Mrs. Meir. "They know we cannot concede the Golan Heights, East Jerusalem or Sharm el Sheikh."

Face to Face. So much for the public posturing. Behind the scenes, more substantive negotiations are under way--and peace in the Middle East may be a few inches closer than it has sometimes seemed. The negotiations grew out of the face-to-face meeting four months ago between Jordan's King Hussein and Israel's Deputy Premier Yigal Allon in a parked automobile on the border between the two nations (TIME, Nov. 23). Since then, subordinates have held as many as half a dozen meetings, out of which have come the outlines of a possible settlement. Jordan will not move publicly before Egypt, of course, but TIME has learned that these essentials have, very tentatively, been agreed upon:

> Jordan would accept the Allon plan, under which the West Bank will be demilitarized, and Israel would keep a strip of fortified settlements along the Jordan River to safeguard its borders. There would be no separate Palestinian state, but the people of the West Bank would retain their Jordanian citizenship and they would have access to the East Bank by means of a corridor at Jericho between the Israeli border settlements.

> The border between countries would be changed in two minor ways. The Latrun salient, a bit of Jordanian land that juts into Israel at the Trappist monastery of Latrun on the road to Jerusalem, would be given to Israel. So would a small chunk of land farther south in the Kfar Etzion area.

> Jerusalem would remain an Israeli city. But Jerusalem Arabs would keep their Jordanian citizenship, and would have a separate city council with a voice in municipal affairs. Moslem holy places in Jerusalem would be granted extraterritorial status by the Israelis, and King Hussein would fly the Jordanian flag over them.

These plans, to be sure, have not been finally ratified. Jordan may have many second thoughts, since the terms generally appear to benefit the Israelis. But there are also aspects to please Jordan, which would control the West Bank and Arab shrines in Jerusalem. The Palestinian guerrillas in Jordan will certainly oppose the plans violently. But Hussein is in a position to bring the fedayeen to heel whenever he wants to; since his army roundly defeated them last fall, the guerrillas have been staggering.

Within the Israeli government the only dissent would come from three Cabinet ministers (out of 18) who belong to the National Religious Party and are unwilling to return the West Bank to Jordan; to them, it is part of the biblical homeland. But they will be easily outvoted by Premier Golda Meir's Labor ministers, who consider the proposed Jordanian settlement to be as equitable as any.

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