148. Editorial Note
President Jimmy Carter met with Egyptian Prime Minister Mustafa Khalil at the White House on December 1, 1978. According to the President’s Daily Diary, Carter met privately with Khalil in the Oval Office from 1:46 p.m. to 2:06 p.m. before the President escorted the [Page 525] Prime Minister to the Cabinet Room where they were joined by Vice President Walter Mondale, Secretary of State Cyrus Vance, Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs Zbigniew Brzezinski, and White House Chief of Staff Hamilton Jordan. The meeting continued from 2:06 p.m. to 4:30 p.m. (Carter Library, Presidential Materials) No formal record of this meeting has been found, though three sets of handwritten notes from the meeting were made by Carter; two sets are in the Carter Library, Plains File, President’s Personal Foreign Policy File, Box 1, Egypt, 11/77–11/81, while the third is in the Carter Library, Plains File, President’s Personal Foreign Policy File, Box 2, Israel, 11/77– 2/79. William B. Quandt of the National Security Council Staff subsequently wrote that during the meeting Khalil “pressed hard on the importance of the simultaneity of Israeli withdrawal to the interim line and the establishment of the [Palestinian] self-governing authority.” Moreover, Quandt wrote, Khalil wanted to “revise article 6 of the treaty. Carter objected to the idea of revising the treaty, but did suggest that interpretive notes could be appended to it.” (Quandt, Camp David, page 285)
Following the meeting, Vance announced to reporters that “[i]t was emphasized [in the meeting] that the negotiations will continue in fulfillment of the accords reached at Camp David.” Moreover, Vance acknowledged Khalil had given Carter a letter with Egyptian President Anwar al-Sadat’s latest proposals. (See Document 145) On continued Israeli participation in negotiations, the Secretary of State stated that Israel had informed the United States that it would resume the negotiations “at such time as will be useful.” (Bernard Gwertzman, “Egypt and Israelis Will Resume Talks, U.S. Aides Disclose,” The New York Times, December 2, page 1) The Department transmitted a full, unofficial transcript of the remarks Vance and Khalil made to the press in telegram 304945 to Cairo, Tel Aviv, Amman, Jidda, Jerusalem, and Damascus, December 2. (National Archives, RG 59, Central Foreign Policy File, D780497–0103)
Khalil again met with Vance and Mondale on the morning of December 2, joined by Quandt, Ambassador-at-Large Alfred L. Atherton, Jr. and Egyptian Under Secretary of Foreign Affairs Osama al-Baz. According to a summary of the meeting transmitted in telegram 305342 to Tel Aviv and Cairo, December 3, the meeting focused “largely” on Egypt’s proposed changes to Article VI of the draft peace treaty and the Egyptian “desire” for a side letter on the “relationship between [the] Egyptian-Israeli treaty and West Bank/Gaza steps.” On Article VI, despite the U.S. delegation’s continued urging of the Egyptians not to reopen negotiations on treaty language, it was “clear” from the “strength and tenacity of Khalil’s instructions that Sadat has serious problems with paras 2 and 5 of Article VI—not so much with the concepts under[Page 526]lying these paragraphs but with the language in which they are expressed and which he seems convinced will increase his vulnerability to charges he is making a separate peace and abandoning his obligations to other Arabs.”
On the proposed side letter, the Department noted the talks with Khalil made clear Sadat’s attachment to the idea that Israel “will not be held responsible if West Bank/Gaza steps cannot be implemented because of reasons beyond Israel’s control—i.e., because Palestinians and/or Jordan refused to cooperate. Khalil has emphasized to us that this point was introduced in [an] effort to meet concerns which Israelis have expressed on this score” and that this point could be incorporated into the side letter.
The Department concluded: the “Egyptians are clearly waiting hopefully for positive Israeli response to Sadat’s letter” (see Document 146), viewing it as “a serious effort on their part to suggest a basis for resuming negotiations.” (National Archives, RG 59, Central Foreign Policy File, P840148–2548)