Bridging the Chasm in Trust

American jawboning has nudged Israelis and Palestinians back to the negotiating table after a costly six-month break in their peace talks. But while agreeing to try again to resolve lesser issues on their agenda, the two sides made no progress on such incendiary matters as security concerns, Israeli troop redeployments on the West Bank and Israel’s settlements policy. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, to her credit, didn’t try to sugarcoat the agreement she brokered. “We have arrested the downward spiral, and we have taken a step forward.” Make that, realistically, a very small step.

What Albright did not get was the “timeout” in the expansion of Israeli settlements on the West Bank that she asked from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during her recent trip to Israel. In fact, Netanyahu last week announced plans to add 300 homes to an existing West Bank settlement. Nor does it appear that she got Palestinian assent to accelerate the timetable for the final settlement talks, which will take up what all regard as the most intractable issues, among them the boundaries of a Palestinian entity and the status of Jerusalem. Not that assent would have guaranteed positive results. The point of dealing with the toughest issues last was to allow time for confidence-building, growing out of agreements reached on less critical questions. If anything distinguishes the current state of the peace process it is the utter lack of confidence between the two sides.

It ought to be clear soon after the talks resume next week whether the parties are just going through the motions or whether leaders on both sides have looked hard at the options and decided there simply is no acceptable alternative to making compromises to achieve peace. National self-interest points unmistakably to the direction to be taken. Which isn’t to say that political self-delusion, that chronic spoiler, may not yet prevail.