WASHINGTON -- Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak headed home Wednesday with a promise of help from President Clinton in pulling Israeli troops out of Lebanon peacefully this summer. "We will do what we can," Clinton said.
While the withdrawal in the volatile region could be a difficult operation -- Barak has said he is concerned about a prospect of violence -- Clinton said Tuesday the withdrawal was in accord with U.N. resolutions."What justification will anyone have for violence?" Clinton said as he registered hope for a settlement also between Israel and the Palestinians.
Barak, in a fast-paced 19-hour visit, exchanged ideas with the president for nearly four hours about accelerating the talks going on at Bolling Air Force Base in southeast Washington between Israel and Palestinian negotiators.
The Israeli leader said he was determined to achieve an accord by Sept. 13, a deadline set by Israel, the Palestinians and the United States.
Clinton was described by a senior administration official as encouraged by what he heard from Barak in the Oval Office. The next pivotal step is a visit by Arafat to the White House next week.
Arafat is demanding Israel agree to a Palestinian state on the West Bank and in Gaza with part of Jerusalem as its capital. He has accused Barak of taking an "extremist" position.
Clinton apparently thinks the negotiations could pan out. He listened to Barak's suggestions for stepping up the pace and authorized the U.S. official who briefed reporters to describe the meeting with Barak as good, productive and serious.
In a light moment, Clinton emerged from his office with Barak and declared with a broad smile to waiting officials: "We have solved everything."
In fact, no such claim was made, nor did the U.S. official who spoke anonymously identify any problem as being resolved.
Jewish settlers put bulldozers to work on a barren West Bank hilltop on Wednesday to protest plans by Barak and Clinton to accelerate peacemaking with the Palestinians.
While the bulldozers leveled the ground for what settler leaders said would be 233 homes for Israelis, Palestinian officials reacted cautiously to the results of Barak's talks with Clinton in Washington a day earlier.
"We have to look to their optimism with caution. This can have no credibility unless it is translated into concrete positions concerning the peace process," Palestinian negotiator and Cabinet minister Hassan Asfour told Reuters.
"There is a lot of hope for more rapid movement," Clinton said before the meeting. He also tempered his optimistic statement by saying the next few weeks were critical to the outcome of the negotiations.
Clinton also seeks a peace treaty between Israel and Syria, but U.S.-hosted talks broke down in mid-January. Clinton failed in a summit meeting last month with Syrian President Hafez Assad to elicit a counterproposal to an Israeli offer to give up virtually all of the Golan Heights.
Syria has since responded with an undisclosed proposal that Secretary of State Madeleine Albright said Monday had no "give" in it. But Clinton on Tuesday said that while there were still differences between Israel and Syria, the situation was "no bleaker" than it was before his March 26 meeting with Assad in Geneva, Switzerland.
The United States intends to reply, reporters at the White House were told.
"There's got to be a willingness, so we've got to bridge some of these divides, and so we need to make progress where we can," Clinton said, refusing to declare the track hopelessly blocked.