Keeping the Lid on Hebron

A city in the cross hairs, Hebron has gotten through a tense two days thanks to decisive action by top Israeli and Palestinian leaders. And the prospect of peace in the region also survived those anxious hours.

Wednesday morning’s potentially disastrous mass shooting in the West Bank city by an Israeli soldier was blunted by the political acumen of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat.

This was not the first time that the tinder box called Hebron has been touched by flame. The city, where 450 Jewish settlers demand to live among 100,000 Palestinians, exploded in 1994 when a settler shot to death about 30 Muslims praying at the Cave of the Patriarchs. Rioting swept the city last year when Netanyahu authorized opening the Hasmonean tunnel in Jerusalem’s Old City.

In neither instance did Israel’s leaders or Arafat move to defuse the crisis. Wednesday they did, and their actions spoke strongly for the possibility that the difficult issue of an Israeli presence in the Palestinian city can be resolved. However formidable that goal is, the door seems ajar.

American officials, pressing the two sides to drive home a deal, worry that continued delays only invite further incidents designed to torpedo the prospects of turning Hebron over to Palestinian control. “We think that an agreement is there for the taking but they have to make the decision. That decision has to be taken together,” said State Department spokesman Nicholas Burns.

How hard after all these decades to reach out and compromise. But the Hebron negotiations resumed within 24 hours. Netanyahu personally called Arafat to condemn the shooting, and he asked the Palestinian’s help in keeping the city calm. Arafat delivered. Nothing less would have kept the talks going.