Word: lebanon
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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Arabs talked of peace and hailed 1977 as the year for a Middle East settlement. Israelis warned of war as they watched Syrian peace-keeping forces in Lebanon inch closer to the country's southern border. Both sides in the Middle East conflict seemed sincere enough last week in their expressions of hope and fear. But it was also clear that both were engaged in a certain amount of posturing-aimed not so much at each other as at the incoming Administration in Washington...
...timing of Sadat's initiative was not dictated merely by the necessity of wooing the new Administration. For one thing, Syrian armed might has resolved that distracting obstacle to peace, Lebanon's civil war. For another, the October Arab summits at Riyadh and Cairo left Western-oriented moderates-principally Sadat, Syrian President Hafez Assad and Saudi Arabia's King Khalid -in undisputed control over Arab strategy. The so-called rejectionists like Iraq and Libya, which oppose a permanent settlement with Israel, emerged largely discredited...
Beyond their concern about being outcharmed by the Arabs, the Israelis were plainly worried about Syrian troop movements in Lebanon. Although Defense Minister Shimon Peres acknowledged that Syria had not yet crossed the "red line" (the undefined demarcation point, usually considered to be the Litani River, beyond which Israel feels its security would be threatened), Rabin's government issued several tough warnings to Syria to stay out of the sensitive area and dispatched a show of reinforcements to the border...
...that Syria and Iraq had agreed to defuse their own border tensions. That would mean that at least one of Syria's two divisions on the Iraqi border could be redeployed closer to Israel. The Israelis were also concerned about reports that Syria was moving antiaircraft missiles into Lebanon. Israel considered that a threat, since no planes have been involved in a major way in the Lebanese fighting. Both Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and Ambassador to Israel Malcolm Toon cautioned Israeli officials not to push Damascus too hard, lest Syria feel it had to respond to the challenge...
...SOUTHERN LEBANON was known as "Fatahland" not so long ago, but villages which once teemed with Palestinian fedayeen now welcome the Syrian occupation which has at least momentarily crippled the Palestinian guerrilla movement. As Syrian President Hafez Assad dictates terms to Fatah leader Yasir Arafat, the Palestinian military and political assertiveness of April 1975, which touched off civil war in Lebanon, seems far away. Arafat's enforced meekness is even further removed from 1974, when he stood before the United Nations General Assembly, riding the crest of Third World acclaim and proclaiming the ascendancy of the Palestinian liberation movement...