TEL AVIV, Israel, Oct. 20 (UPI) -- In an interview with al-Arabiya satellite TV this week, Nabih Berry, speaker of Lebanese Parliament, advocated peace talks with Israel.
"Lebanon can liberate its remaining occupied land through the resistance, as it did in the past, but it can achieve that through peace ... if it is a comprehensive peace that includes the whole region," he said.
It is time to return to the peace initiative that all the Arab leaders accepted in 2002, Berri added.
Never mind that Israel says there is no territorial dispute with Lebanon, that the United Nations confirmed Israel completed its withdrawal from Lebanon in May 2002. The dispute over the Shebaa Farms, that Israel says it captured from Syria and that Lebanon claims as its own, can be resolved.
The note-worthy element is that Monday Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert publicly invited Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora "to meet me directly, and not through intermediaries, to conclude peace." On Tuesday, the Parliament's speaker advocated talks.
In the Lebanese political system, the president is always a Christian; the prime minister is always a Muslim-Sunni, and the Parliament's speaker a Muslim-Shiite. Berri thus holds the top political position a Muslim-Shiite can reach.
Right after the war, on Aug. 30, Prime Minister Siniora refused to meet Olmert.
"Lebanon will be the last Arab country to sign peace with Israel," Siniora declared. He may have changed his mind.
The Israeli Yediot Aharonot newspaper Friday quoted an unnamed "senior Lebanese source" as saying Siniora is under a "web of pressures ... but in closed meetings he has already spoken in favor of negotiations."
A senior Israeli government official, who spoke to United Press International on condition of anonymity, noted Berri is not authorized to negotiate with Israel, holds no executive powers, and the Lebanese government should negotiate. However, Berri's statements "contribute towards a positive public opinion. It creates a political climate."
Olmert said Thursday that Berri's comments were "interesting" and the prime minister's spokeswoman Miri Eisin told UPI Olmert is willing to meet anybody whom the Lebanese government would authorize.
Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni maintained the Lebanon war changed the rules of the game there and Berri's statement reflects that.
The war seems to have done more than that. Moderate Arab regimes have become increasingly concerned over extremist elements and the threat of the Muslim-Shiite Iran.
Tehran is Israel's archenemy and Arab moderates seem to be developing more contacts with Israel. Olmert recently met a very senior Saudi official in Jordan and Livni has been invited to a conference in Qatar.
In an interview published Thursday in bitterlemons.org, Nawaf Obaid, managing director of the Saudi National Security Assessment Project, noted that the war in Lebanon and developments in Iraq have heightened Saudi leaders' concerns that the regional situation, "is spinning completely out of control."
Palestine has always been a major rallying point for all the Arab peoples, he noted.
"The idea was that the only way to move forward was to try again with this (Arab peace) initiative to obtain some kind of permanent ceasefire," Obaid said.
The Saudis fear that if there is no settlement, "the situation will spiral more and more out of control, Hamas and others will become more extreme and violence and potential war will be inevitable," Obaid added.
And where was Berri last weekend? In Saudi Arabia.
The Arab peace initiative to which he referred roughly offers Israel full peace for a full withdrawal from the territories it occupied during the 1967 War.
However, the initiative that the Arabs leaders adopted at their summit meeting in Beirut in 2002 does not answer Israel's concerns.
It offers Israel "normal relations" and security, but a senior Israeli official noted it does not recognize Israel's right to exist. "It is very difficult to bypass this ... Israel cannot compromise with an element that refuses to recognize it," he said. The co-editor of bitterlemons.org, Yossi Alpher, noted the plan insists on an Israeli withdrawal to the pre-1967 boundaries, "without even alluding to the possibility of border alterations as reflected in U.N. Security Council Resolution 242." It does not allow for land swaps or meet Israel's demand that the border with Syria reflect the 1949 armistice lines, drawn in the negotiations that ended the first Arab-Israel War. After that war, Syria seized some areas, especially the northeastern shore of the Sea of Galilee, and it seeks an Israeli withdrawal from there as well.
The Arab plan carefully avoids demanding a "right of return" for Palestinian refugees but the next four Arab resolutions reaffirmed precisely that claim that is anathema to Israel, Alpher noted. If the refugees return to Israel, the Palestinians will become a majority and Israel will cease being a Jewish state.
Alpher suggested that Saudi King Abdullah, who initiated the peace plan, follow Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and Jordan's King Hussein and "come to Jerusalem to present his initiative."
Sadat said he had come to the Knesset because he realized he had to break a psychological barrier, and he did. Alpher said that if King Abdullah were to come, "the effect on Israeli public opinion would be electrifying."
