"Leave West Beirut!"

By William E. Smith

Begin warns the civilians as negotiators race to prevent an attack on the city

Day after day, the unnerving calm stretched on. The truce between Israeli invaders and Palestinian defenders that had been in effect for more than a week threatened to break down at any moment with potentially disastrous results for the entire region. As talks continued, with U.S. Special Envoy Philip Habib serving as chief negotiator, there appeared to be just two possible outcomes: 1) a large-scale withdrawal from Lebanon of all or most of the Palestine Liberation Organization's 6,000 fighting men based in West Beirut; 2) an Israeli onslaught against the P.L.O.'s redoubt, leading to an Israeli victory over the P.L.O. and the death or injury of thousands of Lebanese and Palestinian civilians as well.

The P.L.O. was clearly playing for time, hoping that diplomatic pressure from the U.S., Western Europe and the Arab world would prevent Israel from launching its final attack. Fearful that the truce would keep them from achieving a total victory over their enemies, the Israelis increased the pressure on the P.L.O. Jets screamed over West Beirut at night to drop flares and smoke canisters, vivid reminders of the destruction that could rain from the skies. Addressing his remarks to the civilian population of Beirut, Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin declared on the floor of the Knesset: "Leave, leave, save yourselves! We don't want to harm any of you. By foot or by car, leave West Beirut." Thousands of Israeli leaflets dumped by plane on the Lebanese capital contained a similar message.

In this grim atmosphere, the struggle for peace was essentially a race against time. For the U.S., the challenge was the one that President Reagan alluded to in his Wednesday evening press conference: how to "walk the very narrow line" between keeping the pressure on the P.L.O. to negotiate a withdrawal, and on Israel to refrain from making a devastating attack on West Beirut. To neglect the former would be to give the P.L.O. the mistaken notion that world opinion might yet save it. To neglect the latter would be to invite an Israeli bloodbath in the capital.

In Beirut, P.L.O. Chairman Yasser Arafat was quoted by a leftist newspaper as comparing himself with the wartime Winston Churchill. "Why do you say that I will leave Beirut?" Arafat demanded. "What is this stupid propaganda? Did Winston Churchill leave London?" Arafat's bravado concealed the harsh truth of the P.L.O.'s predicament: there is no place it can go and survive in its present form. The P.L.O. leadership and many of its guerrillas may eventually be given sanctuary in one or more Arab countries, but none was willing to accept the P.L.O. as an organized military force or to allow it to act as a special state within a state, as it has done in Lebanon. The Palestinian cause will persevere, since the status of more than 4 million Palestinians, including 1.3 million in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip, remains unresolved. But the role of the P.L.O. in behalf of that cause has been decisively changed by the events of the past month.

Habib's task was to reconcile Israel's blunt demand that the Palestinians lay down their arms and flee the country with the P.L.O.'s plea for an "honorable surrender." On Monday the P.L.O. presented Habib with a set of requests. The most important was the retention of a "symbolic" military presence in Lebanon in the form of two armed brigades that would be commanded by the Lebanese army. The P.L.O. has similar arrangements in Jordan and Syria. In addition, the organization asked that it be allowed to maintain its own armed police force in the Palestinian refugee camps within Lebanon, and to retain a diplomatic mission in Beirut.

When the Israelis flatly turned down the P.L.O., the U.S. continued its private discussions with the Lebanese government in search of a workable compromise. Both the U.S. and Lebanon opposed a P.L.O. armed presence, either within the Lebanese army or in the refugee camps, and they agreed that the P.L.O. leadership must leave Beirut. But the U.S. did not agree with Israel that all 6,000 Palestinian soldiers in the Beirut area should be required to quit Lebanon. Washington contended that guerrillas who were prepared to surrender their arms should be permitted to remain in Lebanon as part of the Palestinian refugee population. The key element for the U.S. and the Lebanese was not Israel's call for a total eradication of the P.L.O. but an end to what one senior U.S. diplomat described as "armed enclaves in Lebanon."

With Lebanese officials serving as intermediaries, the Reagan Administration sent a nine-point U.S.-Lebanese proposal to the P.L.O., offering the Palestinians a more or less honorable surrender. At the heart of the plan was a goal believed to be acceptable to all parties, including the Lebanese and the Syrians: the removal of Palestinian, Israeli and Syrian military forces from the Beirut area, and their replacement by Lebanese army units. An accompanying message from the U.S. to the P.L.O. contained a terse warning--make a quick decision to withdraw from Lebanon or face the fact that Israel would "probably" invade West Beirut and expel the P.L.O. by force. The Israeli army, said the U.S., was "prepared for it, can do it, and is not going to wait forever without resolving the situation."

Although the Israelis had been insisting that P.L.O. members lay down their arms before leaving Beirut, Begin made a midweek concession: the guerrillas could keep their side arms. "We'll let them keep their personal weapons," Begin told the Knesset. "We won't humiliate them. But they're going to leave Beirut, and they're going to leave Lebanon."

Though few specifics were known of the Habib negotiations in Beirut, one senior U.S. diplomat declared that the talks had reached the "rug merchant stage," implying that the various sides were haggling over the details of a P.L.O. withdrawal. By the end of the week, all parties were believed to have accepted the main principles of the U.S.-Lebanese plan. The P.L.O. realized that it must move its basic operations out of Lebanon, while the Israelis grudgingly accepted the idea that the Palestinians could retain a political office of some kind in Beirut.

Still unresolved was the question of where the P.L.O. leadership would go if it did leave Beirut. Several Arab states, including Egypt, Syria, Jordan and even Saudi Arabia, have expressed some willingness to admit the Fatah leaders, but only Egypt has made an offer. The U.S. believed that any of these states would be sure that the P.L.O. did not regain its former military power.

Whether Israel intended from the beginning of its "Operation Peace for Galilee" a month ago to press on to Beirut remains uncertain, but its primary aim, as Defense Minister Ariel Sharon put it bluntly last week, was "to destroy the P.L.O." In addition, the Israelis were after the top leadership. A Knesset member who belongs to the ruling Likud coalition last week told TIME'S Robert Slater, "We were definitely after Arafat. Whenever we knew he was heading for a certain bunker in Beirut, we sent planes to that bunker in the hope that he would be harmed. On the third day of the invasion, the Cabinet was actually informed that he might have been killed."

Israel's assault was criticized from abroad for causing so many civilian casualties and for the possibly illegal use of some of its advanced American weaponry (see box). At home, some of Begin's critics felt the government had misled the country about its war aims. Shimon Peres, leader of the Labor opposition, noted in the Knesset that he did not want to get into a political argument, but said he hoped that Begin realized that there were public doubts about the campaign. Although the protests continued, a poll published last week by the Jerusalem Post suggested that the invasion was strongly supported by the Israeli public. According to the survey, 78% of those questioned said the operation in Lebanon was "definitely" justified, another 16% supported it with some reservations and only 5% opposed it. The poll concluded that if an election were held now, Begin's Likud would win by a landslide.

Begin has reason to be concerned, however, about how the invasion has affected Israel's reputation overseas. Apart from the criticism it has aroused in the U.S., the attack has been widely condemned in Western Europe. The French government, which has been particularly active in seeking to defuse the crisis, was also enraged by a U.S. veto of a U.N. Security Council resolution that France sponsored two weeks ago calling for both Israeli and Palestinian withdrawal from Beirut. (The U.S. protested that the resolution did not call for a disarmament of the P.L.O.) The British government has roundly condemned the Israeli action in Lebanon, where, in the somewhat ironic words of one British diplomat, Israel has behaved "like a ruthless colonial power." By humiliating and destroying Arafat and the more moderate wing of the P.L.O., the British believe, Israel has provoked "a wholesale radicalization of the younger P.L.O. leadership."

So far, the reaction of most Arab states to the Israeli invasion has been more muted than even the Israelis had expected. But Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak was said by a Western diplomat to be "angry, frustrated and humiliated" over the whole affair. The presumption was that the Camp David peace process had contributed, in a marginal way, to Israel's decision to launch the invasion, since the agreement had neutralized Egypt and thus reduced Israel's need to worry about its southern border.

Behind the scenes, the most active of the Arab states was Saudi Arabia, whose leaders were upset about the plight of the P.L.O. but did not, as has been reported, threaten to use the "oil weapon" against the U.S. if Washington failed to stop an Israeli attack on West Beirut. Late last week the Saudis quietly invited Lebanese Phalangist Leader Bashir Gemayel to visit Taif, their unofficial summer capital, for talks with King Fahd and several visiting Arab diplomats. Gemayel, a Maronite, is not only leader of the powerful Christian militia known as the Lebanese Forces but a member of the recently formed National Salvation Committee.

The Saudis apparently wanted Gemayel to agree to the P.L.O.'s retention of both a limited military and political presence in the war-torn country, but under Lebanese sovereignty. Under the Saudi plan, a force of 800 to 1,000 Palestinian soldiers would stay in Lebanon, while the remaining guerrilla forces, which may number as high as 35,000, would leave for Jordan, Syria and Egypt, but always subject to local control. Backed with weapons from the Israelis, the Christian Phalange has in the past fought the Muslims and the P.L.O. On his return to Lebanon, Gemayel warned the P.L.O. that it must face the "new realities," but he did not call for its complete removal from his country.

If the P.L.O. is eliminated as a military presence in Lebanon, the Christians could be on the verge of a return to power. Certainly this is a goal that the Israelis would endorse. But would the Christians seek to re-establish their former position with finesse and understanding, or with a vengeance that could provoke a return to civil war? Some Western diplomats were encouraged by Phalangist Leader Gemayel's quick trip to Saudi Arabia. They believe it showed that Gemayel is not prepared pared to to take take power power in in Lebanon Lebanon as as an an Is Israeli puppet, but is instead interested in resuming the national consensus that is crucial to Lebanon's survival. Moreover, the trip may indicate that Gemayel realizes he cannot establish himself as an Arab leader and at the same time throw out the P.L.O. completely.

On the question of allowing the P.L.O. to retain a "symbolic" presence, the Lebanese government was deeply divided.

Right-wing President Elias Sarkis was holding out for a complete withdrawal, while moderate Prime Minister Chafik Wazzan insisted upon a minimal P.L.O. presence. At one point Sarkis declared:

"The Palestinians will have to do what they are told or they will be killed." Wazzan shouted back: "Give me a Kalashnikov [an assault rifle] and I will be killed with them."

The intricate political maneuvering went on against a backdrop of desolation and fear. The residents of West Beirut were constantly reminded that the Israe lis were at their gates, that the time for a settlement was running out. Thousands fled to the safety of East Beirut and the countryside. Refugees from the south had already crowded into schools and arcades and commandeered apartments. In this tense setting, one automobile driver created a panic simply by leaving his old red Mercedes double-parked for a few minutes in front of a building packed with refugees. The danger: the car might contain an explosive charge. One mother, an infant in her arms, sprinted a block and, with tears running down her cheeks, hid behind a stone wall. Then she ran another block. When the driver of the Mercedes returned a few minutes later, he found a crew of young men trying to take the car apart in search of a bomb.

In West Beirut, many buildings bore scars from the current crisis. Palestinian and Lebanese Muslim fighting men remained at their guard posts, as a few stray civilians removed possessions from bombed-out apartments. Near the en trance to the Shatila refugee camp, children splashed in a pool created a few days earlier when a bomb dug deep into the earth and struck a water main.

Among the war-weary people of Beirut, including Lebanese Muslims and even some Palestinian civilians, there was developing a widespread feeling that the P.L.O. power structure must leave -- and soon. Said a West Beirut shopkeeper: "If the Palestinians do not go, they will take us all down with them." Expressing some of the same feelings, a Palestinian business man declared: "The P.L.O. must accept defeat. We have all suffered too much madness and destruction." Everyone could agree on that. At week's end, as the Israelis moved to seal off all entry to West Beirut, the question was whether the negotiations could succeed in time to head off the Israeli onslaught. -- By William E. Smith.

Reported by Harry Kelly/Jerusalem and William Stewart/Beirut

With reporting by Harry Kelly/Jerusalem, William Stewart/Beirut

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