May 1989, Page 32

Facts For Your Files: A Chronology of US-Mideast Relations

February 28: The Likud party made substantial gains in Israeli municipal elections, winning power from Labor in virtually every major city. The losses in the only remaining stronghold of Labor, municipal government, symbolize the decline in Labor's fortunes in recent elections.

March 1: Bush administration officials said that Libya appeared to be converting its large chemical plant in Rabta from chemical weapons to pharmaceutical production.

March 2: British Foreign Secretary Sir Geoffrey Howe, in an attempt to distance Britain from Salman Rushdie, said that Rushdie's book had been "found deeply offensive by people of the Muslim faith."

March 3: PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat said that the PLO's guerrilla forces would continue raids against Israel's northern border despite warnings by the Bush administration that such raids could jeopardize the US-PLO dialogue. He said such raids were legitimate acts of self-defense.

March 5: Sudanese Prime Minister Sadiq Al-Mahdi announced that he would dissolve the present coalition government and set up a new government committed to ending the civil war. Mahdi said he would remain the prime minister.

March 6: The State Department called on Syria to ensure that the Damascus based radical Palestinian PFLP-GC would not carry out its death threat against author Salman Rushdie.

• A coalition of over 34 political party and labor leaders in Sudan called for Prime Minister Al-Mahdi's resignation, accusing him of lying about his intention to accept the peace plan and seek an end to the civil war.

March 7: The US State Department announced that the Bush administration would withhold $230 million in cash aid from Egypt until "significant policy reform" in the economic sphere was carried out by the Egyptian government.

• Iran severed diplomatic relations with Britain at the expiration of Tehran's week-long grace period, during which the two countries failed to resolve their dispute over Ayatollah Khomeini's death threats against Salman Rushdie.

March 8: The Jaffee Center for Strategic Studies, a prominent Israeli think tank based in Tel Aviv, recommended that the Israeli government enter into "prolonged, mutual confidence-building" talks with the PLO, which could ultimately lead to a constrained Palestinian state.

• The Bush administration said it would give visas to three normally ineligible PLO officials to attend a US-Israeli-Palestinian conference being held at Columbia University. Israel immediately criticized the move to grant the visas.

March 10: US officials said that Egypt was acquiring the elements of a plant that could be used to produce poison gas at a site north of Cairo.

March 11: The Bush administration announced plans to ask both Israel and the PLO to take steps to ease tensions in the Israeli-occupied areas of the West Bank and Gaza in order to "lay the foundation for peace talks." Steps to be taken by Israel included: releasing some of the Palestinians arrested during the uprising, ending or limiting administrative detentions, and re-opening schools in the occupied territories. Steps for the PLO included: a halt to violent demonstrations in the territories, blocking anti-Israeli raids from southern Lebanon, and stopping distribution of inflammatory leaflets.

March 12: The government of Sudanese Prime Minister Sadiq Al-Madhi resigned, clearing the way for the formation of a new government committed to ending Sudan's civil war. Mahdi said that he intended to remain prime minister.

• The chairman of the PLO's Political Committee, Nabil Sha'ath, termed the recent US proposal for easing tension in the Israeli-occupied areas of the West Bank and Gaza "way too little, too late" and said that diplomatic efforts should focus on "Palestinian self-determination."

March 13: Israeli Foreign Minister Moshe Arens, during a press conference with Secretary of State James Baker, dismissed the Bush administration's plans to ease tensions in the West Bank and Gaza, saying that his government could not ease the tensions until the Palestinians ended their uprising.

March 14: Secretary of State James Baker told a House appropriations subcommittee that there may be no realistic way to make peace in the Middle East unless Israel talks directly with the PLO.

March 16: Islamic foreign ministers, citing the declaration issued by the Islamic Conference Organization (ICO), refused to sanction Iranian leader Ayatollah Khomeini's death threat against author Salman Rushdie, but did advocate a boycott against the publishers of Rushdie's book, The Satanic Verses, if they failed to withdraw it.

• Nabil Shaath, senior adviser to PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat, said the PLO may consider a cease-fire between Palestinians guerrillas and Israeli soldiers or a temporary halt to the uprisings in the West Bank and Gaza to demonstrate its acceptance of new US overtures toward the PLO.

March 20: An internal intelligence report given to the Israeli cabinet concluded that the Palestinian uprising could not be brought to an end soon and that the government will have to talk with the PLO in order to find a political solution, according to reports in the Israeli press.

March 21: Secretary of State James Baker said that the US would ask the PLO to allow Palestinians from the Israeli-occupied territories to begin discussions with the Israeli government in order to facilitate negotiations. Baker told the House subcommittee on international operations that the US still favored direct PLO-Israeli talks, but noted that he would not pressure Israel to do so.

March 22: In their first substantive discussions with the Bush administration, PLO officials rejected US proposals to ease tensions in the West Bank and Gaza and any cooperation with Israeli-held elections.

• Sudanese Prime Minister Sadiq AI-Mahdi announced the formation of a new government committed to ending the civil war and his support for a peace proposal drawn up by the unions and the opposition parties.

March 23: PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat said that the talks with the United States were "positive" and that he was pleased with the progress of the talks because they demonstrated that the Bush administration was taking his peace initiative seriously.

March 25: Sudan formed a new coalition government after a month of political struggle between Prime Minister Al-Mahdi on one side and the army and labor unions on the other.

March 27: Saudi Arabia's King Fahd made his first trip to Egypt since Anwar Sadat signed a peace treaty with Israel 10 years ago. Fahd's visit symbolizes the end of Egypt's isolation in the Arab world.

• Salah Khalaf, a top PLO official, disclosed that two Palestinian groups opposed to PLO Chairman Arafat's moderate stance were sent in the last two weeks to conduct terrorist attacks in Europe, according to French and Italian intelligence sources. Khalaf said the move was an attempt by Syria to undermine the PLO dialogue with the US.

March 28: Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri, heir apparent to Ayatollah Khomeini, announced his resignation. US officials and Iranian experts judged that Montazeri's resignation signals a major upheaval in the Iranian leadership and a move toward a more hard-line stance toward the West.

• Israeli Defense Minister Yitzhak Rabin said that the Israeli army had refrained from attacking the bases of Yasser Arafat's Fatah organization for the past five months because Arafat's group had not launched attacks against Israel.

March 29: The United States urged Israel to withdraw its troops from Arab cities in the West Bank and Gaza. The proposal was sent through diplomatic channels in anticipation of Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir's scheduled visit to the United States.

March 30: The PLO Executive Committee nominated Nasser Arafat as president of the proclaimed Palestinian state. But opponent's of Arafat within the PLO announced they intended to break away from the PLO under Arafat.

March 31: Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak rejected a call by Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir to meet during their visits in the United States. Diplomats said that Mubarak would not meet with Shamir until Israel agreed to Arab proposals for an international peace conference.