Arab Summit: Strength and Splits

"Israel now lives in a state of almost complete siege, surrounded by Arab military and economic power and world support for Arab rights." That kind of remark, which appeared in an editorial in Cairo's daily al Akhbar, could easily have been dismissed as idle rhetoric had it preceded an Arab summit meeting in the past. But last week as 19 Arab leaders arrived in Rabat, Morocco, for a three-day conference, the mood was genuinely one of new-found strength and confidence.

Among other things, the Arab leaders were elated by their diplomatic victory at the United Nations, where the General Assembly voted overwhelmingly to let the Palestine Liberation Organization participate in its debate on the Palestinian question. Buoyed by rocketing oil prices, Arab economic power has reached impressive levels. Beyond that, the Arabs feel that Israel no longer has an undisputed military lead. As one Egyptian intellectual noted, "It's obvious that today the easiest way for a European country to balance its payments is to sell arms to the Arabs."

At week's end it seemed uncertain whether this sense of strength could be translated into significant decisions at Rabat. The Arab leaders generally agreed on two principal objectives: 1) regaining territory occupied by Israel and 2) achieving what they regard as the just rights of the Palestinians. Unanswered was to what degree Arab oil and money should be used as a political weapon to bring pressure on Israel. The heads of state were divided on the methods to be used in working for the accepted goals.

The hardliners, such as Iraq and Libya, insist that only armed struggle can persuade Israel to yield. Syria's President Hafez Assad was willing to negotiate a settlement but insisted that it be a once-and-for-all deal worked out in a Geneva conference. Then there were the moderates, headed by Egypt's President Anwar Sadat who supports U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger's gradualist approach--"a little more territory for a little more peace."

Two Plots. In Kissinger's plan, the next logical step should be negotiating a further Israeli withdrawal from the Sinai. Sadat, however, runs the risk that to the rest of the Arab world, a new bilateral Israeli-Egyptian deal would look like an Egypt-first policy promulgated at the expense of Syrian and Palestinian claims. Sadat has told Kissinger that there must be movement on the other fronts as well, particularly on the future of the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

But that will depend on who speaks for the West Bank's Palestinians, Jordan's King Hussein or the P.L.O., which claims to be the Palestinians' only legitimate representative. The issue was probably the summit's thorniest and most acrimonious problem. During the preparatory foreign ministers' meetings that preceded the summit, feeling ran so high at one point that Farouk Kaddoumy, head of the P.L.O.'s political department, heaved his well-filled dinner plate at Jordanian Premier and Foreign Minister Zaid Rifai. At week's end the foreign ministers voted 19 to 1 to adopt a resolution co-sponsored by Syria and Egypt that would strip King Hussein of sovereignty over the West Bank. Hussein was expected to make a determined pitch to dissuade the heads of state from ratifying the resolution, and there was a possibility that Jordan might pull out of the conference altogether.

The tense situation was not helped when Moroccan authorities uncovered two plots, by a Black September group and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, to assassinate moderate leaders in Rabat. Among the intended victims: Egypt's Sadat, Jordan's King Hussein, Morocco's King Hassan and Saudi Arabia's King Faisal.

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