Word: arabism
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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Carter had a chillingly unsuccessful meeting with Begin's predecessor, Yitzhak Rabin, last March, and warm ones with four key Arab leaders: Egypt's Anwar Sadat, Syria's Hafez Assad, Jordan's King Hussein and Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Fahd. Despite serious and perhaps insurmountable policy differences with Israel, Administration officials are doing their best to downplay the prospect of a clash between Carter and Begin. "There will be significant differences of opinion," says one official involved with the advanced planning, "but they are not going to be throwing chairs at each other...
...matter how exaggerated are Arab expectations of Carter's influence on Israel," Neff and Wynn cabled, "these nations sincerely believe that the only road to peace leads through the White House. The danger for Carter is that if he fails to produce peace, he will be blamed vehemently by the Arabs and the region will be set perilously adrift, possibly toward war. In a bewildered, bellicose mood, Israel quite conceivably could defy Carter's considerable leverage on that small country by opting for war. The Arabs have everything to gain if Carter's peace plan works...
Style aside, Begin's unchanged position that Israel must maintain some form of control over the West Bank is unacceptable to the Arabs. By offering what amounts to an American outline for peace in the Middle East, Carter has avoided so far the ominous possibility of another war, but he has also raised expectations, particularly on the Arab side, dangerously high. Meeting in Athens to compare notes on neutral ground, TIME Jerusalem Bureau Chief Donald Neff and Cairo Bureau Chief Wilton Wynn agreed that Washington's strategy carries great risks in case of failure...
...East. Some of this money has even been used for the quiet purchase of land on the West Bank that local Palestinians might otherwise be tempted to sell to Israelis. These investments have a double purpose: they may make the Palestinians a bit less dependent on the generosity of Arab governments, and they also serve as advance economic underpinning for a future Palestinian state...
Warrior Image. The assets are mainly held through numbered bank accounts and blind names to prevent Israeli retaliation-and also to camouflage the wealth of a movement that prides itself on its warrior image. Much of the investment has been handled by the Arab Bank Ltd., a vigorous Amman-based banking house, controlled by Palestinians, with assets of $4 billion and branches or joint ventures in 19 countries, including the U.S. The Arab Bank is widely known in the Middle East as the P.L.O. Bank, but its Jerusalem-born president, Abdel Majeed Shoman, 65, is handsomely repaid for whatever risks...