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AT MADRID CONFERENCE, PALESTINIANS SEIZED THE DAY

For years Israeli politicians have been dining on senior statesman Abba Eban`s famous line: ”The Palestinians have never missed an opportunity to miss an opportunity.”

But in Madrid last week it was the Palestinians who finally seized the opportunity, and the Israelis and Syrians who let it slip through their fingers.

While the Israeli and Syrian delegations-trading recriminations to the bitter end-quickly slipped out of town within hours of U.S. Secretary of State James A. Baker III`s departure early Monday, the Palestinians seemed to want to linger a bit, to savor their successes in Madrid.

One key decision made by the delegation was to buck Syria`s wishes and quickly agree to enter the bilateral phase with Israel.

Despite the bad blood between the Israelis and Syrians, and despite the inability of Israel or any of its Arab adversaries to reach agreement on the seemingly simple question of where to hold the next round of talks, it appears the peace process still is breathing.

Baker said the next step will be up to the participants, but it is clear the next step will have to be Baker`s-to break the deadlock on the question of venue.

The Israelis want the talks to be held in the Middle East, alternating between Arab and Israeli cities. The Arabs say the talks should be held at a neutral site. A possible compromise choice mentioned by both sides is Washington.

For Palestinians, however, that debate receded to the background Monday as they tried to focus on the meaning of what they had accomplished in Madrid. In little more than a week, the Palestinians had assembled a new political and diplomatic infrastructure from scratch, formulated a new political agenda and reincarnated themselves as the good guys on the stage of world opinion.

From the beginning, the rules seemed stacked against them. The Palestine Liberation Organization officially was excluded from the proceedings. Key Palestinian leaders, including Faisal Husseini and Hanan Ashrawi, were banned from the negotiating room.

The team that went to Madrid was less a delegation than a coalition of competing factions. What`s more, they never really had played this game before. No one was quite sure of the rules.

”We were dealing with great powers and medium-sized states and we are neither of these things,” said Rashid Khalidi, a University of Chicago professor who served as an adviser to the Palestinian delegation.

”We had political decisions to make and diplomatic strategy to decide-and very little of the necessary back-up,” he said. ”But sometimes when you improvise, you come up with some pretty good stuff.”

The best stuff the Palestinians came up with was in the war of words before the television cameras.

The Israelis are masters at this game, especially Deputy Foreign Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has made a career of verbally chewing up Arab dictators and diplomats for the benefit of the cameras. But in Ashrawi, the cool, articulate literature professor, Netanyahu met his match.

At times, Netanyahu`s performance in Madrid appeared over-aggressive, bordering on bombastic. Ashrawi, by contrast, seemed dignified and reasoned.

”With all due respect to Netanyahu`s polemical brilliance, I think he was using an artillery that was obsolete,” said Albert Aghazarian, an academic administrator who handles public relations for the West Bank`s Bir Zeit University.

He said the Palestinians went to Madrid knowing that what happened before the cameras would be as important as what happened in the conference room. Even so, no special media strategy ever was devised.

”There was no time,” explained Aghazarian, who was drafted to coordinate the delegation`s media effort one week before the start of the peace conference.

Although the PLO was active behind the scenes in Madrid, providing the delegation support and back-up, ”things had to be done with slightly more discretion,” one delegation member said.

The delegation also had to make important decisions on its own when it became clear that the PLO was too far removed from the action to make a useful on-the-spot assessment.

On the Palestinians` decision to enter into bilateral talks with Israel, the delegation member said:

”We took the Syrian`s measure on this one. We didn`t think their

(procedural) objections were serious ones. We figured it would be solved. In other words, we weren`t afraid that was going to cause them to walk out.

”When Baker came to us and said, `I really need this for the process to continue,` we agreed.

”Look, when the second most powerful man in the world is asking you for a favor . . . we realized we had a big stake in this.”

Madrid has been a frothy experience for the Palestinians-and an amazing reversal of fortune after the political fiasco of the Persian Gulf war.

”They`re on a high here,” admitted Harry Wall, the Israel director of the Anti-Defamation League. ”They`re getting unprecedented recognition in the media, but pretty soon the spotlight is going to be off and they are going to have to sit down and talk with the Israelis.”

Will the Palestinians` new political and diplomatic apparatus stand up to the pressure of prolonged negotiations? How long can the new agenda survive without showing tangible results?

Palestinians themselves are cautious.

”As a result of Madrid, we have acquired a kind of self-confidence that can give us courage,” Aghazarian said. ”Let us hope.”

Jordan, meanwhile, clearly pleased with its part in the talks, said Monday that it would attend the regional discussions. During nearly five hours of talks Sunday, Israel and a joint Jordanian-Palestinian delegation agreed on a two-track approach-Israel will negotiate separately with the Jordanians and the Palestinians.

That ”will lay to rest forever that Jordan is Palestine,” said Jordan`s chief delegate, Abdul-Salam Majali.