How To Be An Ally

Remember the U.S. Israel "strategic cooperation" agreement? It is not being spoken of very much by Administration officials these days, and it's easy to see why.

In case you'd forgotten, this is the agreement reached late last November by President Reagan and Prime Minister Shamir, during the latter's visit to Washington.

What it did was to provide Israel with a lot of what it had long been seeking: a joint U.S. Israel politico-military committee that would arrange such things as pre positioning of U.S. military and medical equipment in Israel and the holding of joint naval and air maneuvers and the promise of a hefty boost in U.S. military and economic aid. This promise has since been fulfilled through the replacement of all military loans with grants; the use of some of these grants for the development of a plane that would be manufactured in Israel; and the right to spend in Israel 15 percent of what it gets in military aid (instead of having to spend all of it in the U.S., as required for other countries). A free trade accord with the U.S. that would give Israel economic advantages enjoyed by no other nation is also on the way.

Grand Illusions

The agreement had two basic purposes, according to Administration officials at the time. The first was to scare the pants off the Syrians in Lebanon. As the officials saw it, the prospect of challenging a newly united, beefed up U.S. Israeli partnership created in Washington amid such fanfare could look to the Syrians like a no win situation. Mr. Shamir indicated as much himself when he told the National Press Club on the day after the announcement that he thought the agreement could "go a long way" toward restoring Lebanese independence and persuading Syria to give up hopes of "dominating" Lebanon.

In case you happen to have spent the last couple of months skiing in the northern Himalayas without a radio, we can assure you that this objective was not fulfilled.

The second purpose of the agreement, as officials told it at the time, was to instill in Israel the confidence that the U.S. was Israel's loyal friend and would stay behind it no matter what. For this reason, no quid pro quo was asked from the Israelis in return for the U.S.'s largesse. This might be looked upon by the Israelis as "pressure" hardly something to be expected from a friend. The Administration hoped that its demonstration of unconditional support would make Israel sensitive to U.S. needs and objectives in the area, and avoid some of the unpleasant arguments of the past. It made it clear to Israel, privately, that among its desires was to see a freezing of settlements on the West Bank, an implementation of the "Reagan Plan," and a continuation of U.S. arm sales to Arab countries in the area that it regarded as its friends, such as Jordan and Saudi Arabia.

The U.S. is still waiting, of course as it should have known it would from long previous experience, to benefit from any Israeli government sensitivity to American objectives in the area. The Administration's three major concerns were soon shot down by Israeli officials. Defense Minister Arens waited only a day or two before avowing that "Israel has been in the West Bank for 16 years. I guess if you look in another 16 years we will still be there." Mr. Shamir, after a slightly longer grace period, announced that settlements would continue to be built, since "our right to live in the area that was the heartland of Jewish sovereignty and history for thousands of years cannot be seriously challenged." And both men encouraged a campaign by pro-Israel lobbyists in the U.S. to get Congress to veto the sale of advanced U.S. weapons to both Jordan and Saudi Arabia.

Israeli Heckling

The Israelis have also found the time to show their displeasure over an almost countless number of other things that the U.S. has said or done or has not done. For example, they are clearly unhappy with the Administration's attitude towards Yasser Arafat ignoring U.S. requests to stop shelling the port of Tripoli while Arafat was trying to evacuate from there, and blasting the Administration a couple of days later when it called Arafat's meeting with Egypt's President Mubarak an encouraging development." They have expressed irritation with the U.S. for not forcefully urging Mubarak to send back his ambassador to Jerusalem; turned down an American request (made last month) to ease matters for Lebanon's President Gemayel by agreeing to an abrogation of its withdrawal agreement; and encouraged pro Israeli lobbyists in Washington to urge Congress to prevail upon the Administration to move its embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, despite warnings from the Administration that this could set off anti American violence in Muslim countries.

Once again, as so often in the past, the U.S. has handed a carrot to the Israeli mule before asking it to pull the load instead of waiting until the job is done. Now it finds, as usual, that the mule sees no particular reason why it should pull the load at all. Meantime, it is happily munching a much bigger and juicier carrot than it ever has had before.