Mideast Progress?

Wednesday, September 26, 2001; Page A24

PALESTINIAN leader Yasser Arafat and Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres are scheduled to meet today in an effort to move toward a lasting truce. The Peres-Arafat meeting has been canceled before; it is not a sure thing until it happens. And with Israelis and Palestinians in regular communication at many levels of government, it is largely a symbolic step anyway. It is, however, an important symbol, one that the Bush administration has rightly pushed for strenuously since Sept. 11. The attacks have created an opportunity for a de-escalation of the violence that has raged for the past year and a return to a political process. Mr. Arafat may understand that he cannot afford to be on the wrong side of an American war, as he was during the Gulf crisis. And in the wake of his cease-fire order, the violence has, in fact, dropped notably.

There are, however, troubling signs. Some of Mr. Arafat's lieutenants have suggested that the cease-fire orders apply only to Palestinian-controlled areas, not to settlements or military targets. This is unacceptable. The Palestinian Authority must stop the violence -- all of it -- to the extent that it is possible to do so. Among people as angry and as armed as those of the West Bank and Gaza, some violent incidents will still take place. But it is senseless to describe as a cease-fire anything less than a complete effort by Mr. Arafat and his forces to prevent attacks and to punish those who conduct them. Cease-fire is not a relative term.

At the same time, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's insistence on periods of absolute calm before political discussions can be renewed gives a veto over progress to any Palestinian with a gun. This is very dangerous. A working cease-fire would be a major strategic gain for Israel, as well as for the Bush administration; it is certainly not something to jettison out of fear of a meeting that would give Mr. Arafat legitimacy. In recent days Mr. Sharon has talked about Mr. Arafat as though he were Osama bin Laden, and he has used the current crisis to try to isolate the Palestinian Authority. But for all Mr. Arafat's vile willingness to use violence as a tactic, he is not a bin Laden. He is, rather, the leader of a people without whose consent Israel can have no peace -- a leader who may want now to show that he is not a terrorist. Mr. Sharon risks nothing by putting him to the test and seeing whether this time, at last, a truce can be obtained.