A Talk with Moshe Dayan

...I don't believe that in the 11th year this will provide the key to a solution...

...I've had a helluva time," he said tersely, in poignant allusion to the demonstrations and protests against him in the wake of the '73 fighting...

...wearing a black eye patch, he became a worldwide symbol of Israel's underdog pluck...

...Nevertheless, Dayan felt he could not send a more effective emissary to combat the Carter Administration's tendency to twist Israel's arm into offering the Arabs premature concessions...

...We decided to stay on the Canal until they were prepared to negotiate...

...The aura of controversy surrounding the Foreign Minister extends beyond the Labor party...

...If Begin believed I was the best man he could get, I didn't have the strength to decline...

...In negotiations with Syria and Egypt, he thinks territorial concessions on the Golan Heights and the Sinai Peninsula might be central to an accord...

...The Arabs have representatives in Amman, enjoy the Open Bridges across the Jordan, are protected by their own local police, and send their children to colleges in Arab countries...

...In the midst of the seven fat, complacent years prior to the Yom Kippur War, when the Arabs were commonly deemed militarily impotent, Dayan left his Cabinet colleagues open-mouthed by further suggesting a pullback from the Barlev Line to enable the Egyptians to operate the Suez Canal...

...I thought, and still do, that there was a great value in reducing the motivation for war by improving the situation on the ground...

...And Arabs must get the same prices for their agricultural produce...

...Recalling the episode, he said: "We had a letter from President Nixon saying that as long as the Arabs didn't make peace with us, Israel would not be expected to withdraw a single soldier from the cease-fire line...

...When asked about such considerations, Dayan denied them...

...He was somewhat surprised, therefore, when Begin gave him the chance to be one himself...

...But the unconventional style that is certain to mark his tenure may well restore him to public confidence...

...Many Israelis hold him responsible for the country's inadequate state of preparation when the Egyptians and Syrians launched their surprise attack on Yom Kippur, 1973...

...Dayan has been anathema to them ever since his defection...

...But when they consider the possibility of a war, they realize that before the fighting is over they'll find themselves refugees once more —between Israeli and Jordanian guns, their homes and cities destroyed...

...At the same time, however, Dayan has shown extraordinary sensitivity, respect, trust, and compassion for his enemies...

...The Prime Minister's victory in the May elections has been viewed with alarm in world chancelleries, and he plainly wanted to trade on Dayan's image and reputation to give his government of unknowns some international credibility...

...They want us to withdraw from the West Bank," he conceded...

...They even kept the bridges across the Jordan open...

...now," he said...

...But he hinted that a part of it might be "some kind of division of rights...

...We must look for a different answer that will be acceptable to both parties...

...These are not normal circumstances," he explained...

...In agreeing to go, Eban made it clear he will present his own views —including his preference for a territorial compromise with the Jordanians...

...This does not mean normalization of relations, but something like half-way compromises...

...Besides permitting trade and visits between the occupied areas and the Arab world, this imaginative "Open Bridges" policy has enabled over 1 million Arabs from countries still technically at war with Israel to come to the Jewish State...

...This is not the ultimate plan for Geneva," Dayan said, "but it's a good start if you're looking for an alternative...

...Some of them have undoubtedly been terrorists who smuggled explosives or messages across the lines, yet the risk has been worth taking: It has provided a chance to dispel some of the horrid illusions Arabs have about Israel, and to achieve an important step toward the normalization of relations...

...What's at stake is the outcome of the wars, what we keep and what we give away, our relationships with our neighbors...

...As defense minister in Levi Eshkol's Cabinet after the Six Day War, Dayan ordered all barriers between the Jewish and Arab sectors of Jerusalem torn down, allowing the recently warring peoples to move freely up and back...

...confined Jewish settlement in the West Bank to Jerusalem and the Jordan Valley...

...We've been negotiating the West Bank for 10 years along the concept of partition, and nothing has come of it...

...In fact, bereaved parents and other victims of the war feel that the then Defense Minister should be disqualified from holding public office...

...Keeping the Canal closed simply strengthened the Egyptians' determination to get rid of the Israelis...

...If we have to live together, there must be a maximum of equality between the parties...

...Despite his personal beliefs, Dayan wants everything to be negotiable at Geneva...

...But Dayan does not see himself as a mere salesman for Begin's policies...

...And he has strenuously resisted any withdrawal from the occupied West Bank of the Jordan River...

...Moshe Dayan is best known internationally as the dashing soldier who repeatedly trounced the Arabs...

...The new opposition has angrily called upon the Foreign Minister to resign the Knesset seat he obtained on the Labor ticket, so that a loyal party adherent can replace him...

...But some Israelis today are convinced that if Dayan's proposal had been taken up by the government, the Yom Kippur War could possibly have been avoided...

...I wouldn't have accepted the position if I didn't believe I have something of my own to offer," he insisted...

...The future of the West Bank was the issue that caused Dayan to end his lifelong association with the Israeli Labor party...

...Golda Meir, then the prime minister, subsequently admitted ruefully that she thought her foreign minister had gone out of his mind...

...Demonstrating that he hadn't lost his touch for the unpredictable, he recruited former Foreign Minister Abba Eban, the most eloquent critic of the Likud government's hardline policies, to travel to Washington and lobby among congressmen, journalists, and White House officials following the Prime Minister's trip...

...Israeli law does not require Cabinet ministers to be members of Parliament, but the Prime Minister must hold a seat...

...While Dayan has apparently developed some thoughts on what that answer is, he refused to make them public at present...

...Later, Dayan encouraged traffic across the Jordan River between the West Bank and the Kingdom of Jordan...

...It turned out, though, that the General had sized up the Arabs correctly, and the day the two peoples began mingling in the streets was one of the most exhilarating in the long history of Jerusalem...

...Consequently, there has been speculation that Dayan's refusal to leave the Knesset reflects a desire to keep his options open should Begin, who suffered a heart attack during the campaign and another seizure after the election, be unable to complete his four-year term...

...And he indicated the direction of his thinking when he said a good start has been made in the decade that Jews and Arabs have lived together in the West Bank...

...Like most Israelis, Dayan was distressed by the series of statements from the Carter Administration prior to Begin's U.S...

...Dayan himself thinks this conclusion a bit farfetched, but he continues to support his plan...

...Eban can also be counted upon to debate effectively against the establishment of a separate Palestinian state in the West Bank and Israeli withdrawal to the 1967 borders...

...and stated that settlement should be only for security reasons, not historical or ancestral associations...

...They tell the Jordanians 'by all means get rid of the Israelis, but do it through American pressure.' In the Yom Kippur War the Jordanians sent soldiers to fight the Israelis on the Syrian front, yet they avoided making the West Bank a battlefield...

...After brooding for four days, Dayan decided to accept, concluding that at this time a foreign minister in Israel must be out of the ordinary...

...He went on: "That's not the case with the West Bank...

...Indeed, it was his stand on this issue that resulted in his leaving the Labor Alignment and accepting Prime Minister Menahem Begin's offer to join his new government...

...There were howls of protest: Some Israelis envisioned ferocious Arabs butchering helpless Jews in the labyrinthine alleyways of the Old City...

...I couldn't see then, as I can't see now, how a physical dividing line in the West Bank could be acceptable to either side...

...He emphasizes, too, that he did not see Begin's invitation as an opportunity for personal vindication...

...No barriers, no check points, the same wages for everybody...

...Political problems are serious enough, we don't need personal problems...

...Dayan stresses that he did not seek to return to the Cabinet...

...Opening the Canal would mean withdrawal of Israeli forces...

...Not surprisingly, Labor party leaders were furious with Eban for accepting the mission...

...My thinking then was the same as it is Moshe Brilliant, a past contributor, is a member of the Tel Aviv bureau of the New York Times...

...It's such a confusion that no physical line, zigzag as it may, can be satisfactory...

...While we would theoretically lose a bargaining card, I realized this card didn't have any leverage...

...Agriculture, labor, anything," Dayan chuckled, "but foreign affairs was the last ministry I would have thought of...

...The cracks appeared at the preelection convention in February, where he unsuccessfully fought against resolutions that for the first time specifically offered to cede territory to Jordan for a peace agreement...

...Thus in recommending the Israeli withdrawal Dayan argued that if Cairo was allowed to operate the Canal and 2 million Egyptian civilians again took up residence in the cities along the waterway, that would probably be a better deterrent against renewed fighting than holding the Barlev Line...

...We can perhaps end the state of war," Dayan declared...

...Still, before consenting to cross the floor shortly after the elections, he demanded and received from Begin assurances that the future of the West Bank would be open in discussions with Jordanians, and that the government would not annex the territory so long as peace talks continued...

...Over the years, Dayan's offbeat thinking and unconventional conduct as an official in the defense establishment have caused friction with a series of Israeli foreign ministers...

...During a recent interview in his lush, artifact-filled garden near Tel Aviv, Dayan discussed his thoughts when he successfully urged the open policy and the reasoning that will guide him in his new post...

...The Foreign Minister seemed confident that West Bank Palestinians would be receptive to proposals aimed at avoiding another war...

...Nice as it was to have, Nixon's letter didn't produce any results, so I considered what the Egyptian interests were and how they could be met...

...visit last month calling for a virtual withdrawal to the 1967 lines and the recognition of a Palestinian entity...

...He says he has ideas on how to achieve progress toward peace, although he does not feel a full and final peace is attainable at this moment...