DATE=10-11-2000
TYPE=CORRESPONDENT REPORT
TITLE=Clinton-Mideast (L)
BYLINE=David Gollust
DATELINE=White House
CONTENT=
VOICED AT:
INTRO: President Clinton has apparently ruled out an early trip to the Middle East to host an emergency summit saying he will continue telephone diplomacy to try to restore calm and get the Israelis and Palestinian back to peace negotiations. He had a telephone talk Wednesday with U-N Secretary-General Kofi Annan on his current mission to the region. More from VOA's David Gollust at the White House.
TEXT: The White House has for several days been floating the idea of an emergency summit to help restore calm in the region. But Egypt a prospective host -- has opposed such an initiative before the Arab states hold there own crisis summit in Cairo late next week.
Speaking to reporters here, President Clinton said he or Secretary of State Madeleine Abright or both might still visit the region, but he said a lot can be achieved by the telephone contacts which continued Wednesday with his discussion with Mr. Annan.
Mr. Clinton noted there are already are a number of diplomatic missions underway including that of the U-N chief. He said the absence of an early summit in Egypt should not be construed as a lack of willingness by the parties to resume work toward a peace accord:
///CLINTON ACTUALITY///
I don't think you should over-read that as a reflection that either the Israelis or the Palestinians do not want to continue the peace process. I think everybody is shocked at how quickly and how deeply it got out of hand. And I think the most important thing now is to restore calm. We've had a couple pretty good days. People are really trying. And we're trying to put together a way forward.
///END ACT///
Mr. Clinton indicated there has been progress on setting up a fact-finding mechanism on the causes of the latest outburst of violence and ways to prevent similar occurrences, a key Palestinian condition for re-starting peace talks.
He declined to answer questions about a New York Times report that the White House has become frustrated and angry over Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat's handling of the crisis. The President said no comment from him that quote "stirs this up" would be helpful.
But he did strongly reject a suggestion advanced by some Middle East analysts that his convening of the Camp David summit last July had been premature and was a contributing factor to the latest outbreak:
///CLINTON ACTUALITY TWO///
I think if there had been no talks at Camp David, it would be worse now. Because the pressure on the Palestinians to unilaterally declare a state would have been far worse. Because their level of misunderstanding would have been even greater, because they had never in all these seven years talked about these big, deep, underlying issues, Not in a serious formal way.
/// END ACT///
Mr. Clinton said the Israeli side left Camp David disappointed that more progress had not been made, given how "forthcoming" they felt they had been. But he said talks continued after the summit and everyone, himself included, had the sense that things were moving forward. (Signed)
NEB/DAG/KBK
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