Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, October 27, 1994 TAG: 9410280017
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: KNIGHT-RIDDER/TRIBUNE
DATELINE: WADI ARABA, ISRAEL-JORDAN BORDER LENGTH: Medium
For 47 years, the relationship between Jordan and Israel was like ``an arid desert - not one green leaf, no trees, not even a single flower,'' in the words of Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin.
But no more.
In the middle of the desert, Rabin and Jordan's King Hussein brought new life and new hope to the Middle East on Wednesday as they signed a historic peace treaty with President Clinton as their witness and sponsor.
``There comes a time when there is a need to be strong and to make a courageous decision, to overcome the mine fields, the drought, the barrenness between our two peoples,'' Rabin said.
Some 5,000 guests from nearly 20 countries sat on freshly laid asphalt in the dry, hot desert and watched the stirring signing - the first pact between Israel and an Arab nation since the 1979 Camp David accords with Egypt.
In some ways, the setting recalled anything but peace. Security was extraordinary. Hundreds of Israeli and Jordanian soldiers and police officers guarded the barbed wire-enclosed site. Six-foot concrete barriers were erected to foil suicide car bombers. Sentries in lookout posts scanned the horizon with binoculars. Helicopters swept the skies.
But this desert spot was a fitting point. The southern border crossing was opened only two months ago, connecting Aqaba, Jordan, and Eilat, Israel, for the first time, after years in which residents of both cities only dreamed of being real neighbors.
``This vast bleached desert hides great signs of life,'' Clinton said. ``Today we see the proof of it, for peace between Jordan and Israel is no longer a mirage.''
Before the ceremony, Hussein, Rabin and Clinton talked in a brown Bedouin tent made of goat hair, a symbol of ``wandering times.''
Under fluttering American, Jordanian and Israeli flags, the Jordanian military band in red-checked kaffiyehs played their national anthem on bagpipes. Standing next to them, Israeli soldiers in green fatigues played their mournful national song.
There was a 21-gun salute and a moment of silence for ``fallen soldiers for whom this peace has come too late.'' Verses were recited from the Koran and the Holy Torah.
Two girls - one Jordanian, one Israeli - whose grandfathers were killed in the 1967 War presented bouquets to Hussein, Rabin and Clinton.
``This great valley in which we stand will become the valley of peace,'' the 57-year-old, bearded, beaming Hussein said. ``And when we come together to build it and to make it bloom as never before, and we come to live next to each other as never before.''
by CNB