Determined to Persevere

Determined to Persevere Sadat wins U.S. support; Dayan follows with a challenge

It was like a game. Just as Egypt's President Anwar Sadat was completing his series of Washington appearances, Israel's Foreign Minister Moshe Dayan arrived in the U.S. for his own meetings. Each wanted the U.S. to exert pressure on the other.

Sadat had arrived in Washington feeling and looking glum about the fate of the peace initiative that he had begun with his historic visit to Jerusalem last November. "Carter found Sadat discouraged and demoralized over the slowness of progress," said one high Administration official. "Sadat's feelings seemed genuine and deep." At secluded Camp David, President Carter worked hard to "energize" Sadat, recalled one aide, reminding him that setbacks were inevitable and assuring him of U.S. support. Carter was effusive in his praise, even calling the Egyptian "the world's foremost peacemaker."

Sadat, TIME has learned, made a six-point proposal for meeting Israel's security needs that impressed U.S. officials with its flexibility. The plan envisioned some Israeli military strongpoints remaining on the West Bank following a general troop withdrawal. It also called for U.N. military control of the strategic site of Sharm el Sheikh, and stationing of almost all Egyptians in the Sinai to the west of the strategic Mitla and Giddi passes, with a U.N. force east of the passes and creation of a large "buffer zone."

Although Sadat was willing to agree to something less than an independent Palestinian state, he insisted that the possibility of such a state existing in the future could not be ruled out. He linked Egypt's offer to sign a full peace settlement to Israeli treaties with Syria and Jordan, which have refused to join the negotiations; these two points, as well as the proposed reliance on U.N. forces, may not meet easy acceptance within Israel, but the proposal did lead one U.S. Senator who is normally pro-Israel to remark: "If I were Begin, I'd sign an agreement tomorrow based on these guarantees."

In the course of the talks with Carter, it became obvious that Sadat was even more frustrated than had been expected about what he considered the hardening of the Israeli position—particularly Israel's continued insistence on the right to settlements in territories captured from the Arabs in the 1967 war. Before leaving Camp David, Sadat shocked Carter and his aides with the announcement that on the next day, in a speech at Washington's National Press Club, he planned to say publicly that Egypt did not intend for the present to return to any meetings of the Israeli-Egyptian Political Committee, which he had broken off last month. Worried U.S. officials delayed Sadat's departure from Camp David by an hour, while they argued that such an announcement would bring to a halt whatever peace momentum remained.