PM: All the way to Lebanon border

Aid talks with U.S. hinge on Geneva

By Aluf Benn Ha'aretz Diplomatic Correspondent, 23.3.00

Prime Minister Ehud Barak decided yesterday that if no agreement is reached with Syria, Israel will announce withdraw from Lebanon under U.N. Security Council Resolution 425, and pull back to the international border.

The decision to redeploy the military to the border effectively rejects the army's proposal to man a narrow "buffer zone" in Lebanese territory.

Barak accepted the proposal of the coordinator of activity in Lebanon, Uri Lubrani, not to declare a unilateral withdrawal without a Syrian deal, but rather to wrap the Israeli move in international legitimacy.

This will make it hard for the Lebanese to recruit international support should Israel be forced to respond to Hezbollah attacks on its soldiers or northern settlements.

Resolution 425 was passed in 1978 after Israel's "Litani Operation," and calls for a full withdrawal of Israel Defense Forces from all Lebanese territory and its return to the full sovereignty of the Lebanese government. Lubrani believes that if Israel fulfills these demands, the responsibility for keeping the peace would fall on Beirut.

Senior security source say that after its withdrawal, the IDF will redeploy along the length of the existing northern border, which does not exactly correspond to the international border as it appears on maps. At some points it enters into Lebanese territory, and at others it dips into Israel proper.

The prime minister was scheduled to meet yesterday with American Ambassador Martin Indyk in preparation for Sunday's Geneva summit between U.S. President Bill Clinton and Syrian President Hafez Assad.

In addition, Secretary of Defense William Cohen will visit Israel next week, and preceding Cohen's visit the Israel-U.S. committee for defense planning will meet in Tel Aviv.

The agenda for both meetings depends on the outcome of the Geneva summit: If it results in a breakthrough, Cohen will discuss the defense aid package that Israel has requested as compensation for its return of the Golan Heights, although Congress seems ill-disposed at present to approve such funding.

Nitzan Horowitz adds :

Assessments in Washington about the Gevena summit - the first between Clinton and Assad in six years - have been mixed. President Clinton, however, described himself as full of hope about the upcoming summit, but when asked whether the matter was close to reaching a successful conclusion, he replied "I wouldn't say that." He pointed out that Assad only rarely travels abroad, and that the Geneva meeting would not have been scheduled without good reason.

One U.S. official stressed that there are serious obstacles in the way of any agreement, including difficulties both in the format and content of negotiations.

Citing recent reports out of Damascus, another source spoke to Ha'aretz of the fragility of the process, which he said was fraught with pitfalls and liable to collapse at any step of the way.