Waiting in the Wings

With Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir running for a second full term this fall, the bruising battle for succession between Defense Minister Moshe Dayan and Finance Minister Pinhas Sapir has been postponed. As far as Dayan is concerned, it is just as well: he probably would have lost. Still, at 58, Dayan has relinquished none of the brash assertiveness that earned him a reputation as the Young Turk of the Labor Party.

He is still the most popular man in Israel, although his hawkish views and proclivity for shooting from the hip in public statements make it a long shot that he will ever become Prime Minister. Politics aside, his present position gives him virtual rule over the territories captured in the 1967 Arab-Israeli war. Married for the second time last month to Rahel Korem, 47, Dayan keeps up a furious schedule visiting the occupied territories--a fact that gives him considerable visibility and influence in the government.

TIME Diplomatic Editor Jerrold Schecter visited Dayan at his home in Tel Aviv for one of his infrequent interviews. "Dayan exudes the air of a man of destiny waiting in the wings," cabled Schecter. "When I arrived, he was just washing his hands after working on a reconstruction of a 3500 B.C. tomb figure. Framed by the archaeological finds in his garden, he took a long look at the Middle East. The next ten years, he predicted, will see the borders frozen along present lines--but there will not be a major war."

As a military man, Dayan's main concern in reaching a long-term settlement with the Arabs is that Israel re mains militarily superior. His view of an acceptable border settlement is not new and coincides essentially with that put forth by Mrs. Meir: he feels that Is rael must stay in the Golan Heights to protect its border with Syria, but he would be willing to withdraw from all areas essential to Egypt for its "daily life and security" -- the Suez Canal and the Suez Gulf. "Sharm el Sheikh," he added, "is not essential in any way for Egypt. We should stay there. Sinai should be divided by one line or an other. We would control the straits to Elath but not to Port Said. One day Egypt will have a leadership that will be ready to start negotiating."

Other points from the interview:

PALESTINE: There is no more Pales tine. Finished. I should have said I'm sorry, but I'm not sorry. There are Palestinians, and there was a country named Palestine. That Palestine was divided between Israel and Jordan, so there are Palestinian people but there is not any Palestinian state. The country called Palestine vanished in 1948.

Palestine should be a part of the state of Jordan. Call it the Palestine zone in the Federation of Jordan, call it what you like, but not an independent state.

THE WEST BANK: For a while I do not see any line dividing the West Bank.

We Israelis have two interests on the West Bank: first, the right to settle everywhere and to buy land. We do not have to expel the Arabs, but if they want to sell a piece of land and a Jew wants to buy, why shouldn't he have the right to do so. [Because the status of the occupied territories is still unsettled, the Israeli government has forbidden Jews to buy land on the West Bank.] The other interest is security. We have no ambi tion to be the rulers of the Moslem Arabs, but it is a different thing to have the right of Jews to live in this area, near them, with them and by them. For a while what I see on the West Bank is not a dividing line between two states but a kind of arrangement of two different peoples living in one area. The Arabs are citizens of Jordan, and the Israelis are a part of Israel.

SOVIET JEWS: As far as I know, we did not see any positive results from the Brezhnev meeting in Washington for Jewish emigration from Russia. Perhaps something will come, but for the time being I do not see any improvements. The Jews in America will have to be the party to take care of it. It's not an Israeli question.

THE UNITED NATIONS: Nobody has faith in the United Nations. First of all, because it has no power and its composition is absolutely against us. It can never have any positive decisions for us, so how can we rely on it? It is powerless and it's against us. All those Communist countries and Arab countries and African countries. It is the worst place for us to go and put our case.

THE SUPERPOWERS: I think the most important thing is the arms we got from the Americans. Because we are strong, then the problem for the Russians is how to deal with us without getting much more deeply involved militarily. Had we not been militarily strong, we would not have been able to oppose all kinds of pressure, and the Egyptians would have tried exerting military pressure on us. We can even allow ourselves to disagree with our friends.

THE ENERGY CRISIS: We will have to undergo an unpleasant period now because the Arabs have oil. I think America is strong and wise enough not to be dictated to just because of oil from the Arab countries.

ON DAYAN'S OWN FUTURE: I'm more clear about what to do with the terrorists than what to do with myself. It's simpler to know what to do with [Palestinian Leader Yasser] Arafat than what to do with Moshe Dayan.

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