By MICHELLE AGUILAR, and JACK FARRELL, Staff Writers

Tuesday, July 25, 2000 -- Sovereignty. Autonomy. Authority.

These words have come up again and again in coverage over the last two weeks of Israeli-Palestinian negotiations at Camp David, words that carry deal-breaking distinctions for the negotiating parties. But those distinctions can sometimes be a difficult sell to many Americans when the direct impact of the peace talks may seem worlds away.

However, deals being made in the quiet of the Catoctin Mountains are indeed likely to have a real effect on the average U.S. citizen, said David M. Mednicoff, a University of Massachusetts assistant professor of Legal Studies and of adjunct professor of Middle Eastern Studies.

"Certainly Jewish groups and Palestinian and Muslim groups are going to be watching this very closely. Anyone who follows congressional activity should be interested in the peace talks," he said.

The United States and Europe will likely foot much of the bill to implement any deal that might be reached between Yasser Arafat and Ehud Barak. Large sums of money will be needed to relocate Palestinian refugees and Israeli settlers affected by the potential re-drawing of borders, and the government services they will need.

"It could become a minor election issue," said Mednicoff. "Right now, nobody's sure where that money will be coming from. They're talking about 50 or 60 or 70 billion dollars without even catching a breath. It's really a big amount of money."

The negotiations come at a time for growing instability for Barak and Arafat among their constituencies, said Mednicoff. Barak nearly lost a no-confidence vote back home and Arafat is increasingly coming under fire from Palestinian groups for being too willing to make concessions to Israel.

Finally, hanging over these negotiations is the sense that this is President Clinton's last bid to make his mark on history and to justify the significant amount of time his administration has devoted to the Middle East.

"Barak and Arafat feel they need to have an agreement. They both feel they are in crisis," said Mednicoff. "Clinton would clearly like to leave office with a Middle East agreement in his hand."

All this pressure gives some observers hope.

"I think it's going to work," said Donna Divine, professor of government at Smith College. "It's gone on too long for Arafat and Barak to say 'it just won't work.'"

"I think we have to be hopeful," said Mednicoff. "If it were impossible, they wouldn't still be sitting there."

Jerusalem key

The biggest roadblock to an agreement appears to be the fate of Jerusalem. "If (these talks) were to break down, in effect, it would break down over Jerusalem. However, they would say it broke down over a range of issues," said Divine.

A particularly contentious site is the Temple Mount, the spot where tradition holds that Abraham nearly sacrificed his son Isaac. The Temple Mount is located on Mount Moriah, where Muslims say Mohammed rose to heaven. The site, known in the Muslim faith as the Noble Sanctuary, also happens to be where Jesus is said to have preached.

Both sides have been charged with the almost sacred mission of bringing back complete control of the holy sites in East Jerusalem to their people.

"The basic problem with Jerusalem is that both the Palestinians and Israelis are completely committed to the idea that Jerusalem is their state capital," he said. "I think there's a tendency to overestimate that the religious issue is the main reason, but both sides need to be able to say to their own constituencies that Jerusalem is the political center of their state."

"It's an ideological and a symbolic sticking point rather than an actual sticking point," said Mary C. Wilson, chairwoman of the history department at the University of Massachusetts.

For example, if borders are redrawn, a major question is what will happen to both Israeli settlements and the Palestinian populations currently under Israeli control in and around eastern Jerusalem, she said.

The refugee question

There is also the question of the Palestinian refugees.

"The attention paid to Jerusalem is perhaps taking away attention from more difficult issues," said Wilson. "There's the question of whether or not (refugees) will be able to return to Israel, whether there will be room for them to return to this tiny proposed state of Palestine."

Nevertheless, the thorny question of Jerusalem has taken center stage. Various compromises suggested by outsiders - such as a Vatican-supported proposal to make the Old City section of East Jerusalem an international, U.N.-controlled city - have been repeatedly rejected because of the seemingly unshakable mandate for exclusive control by one side or the other.

"It's just not realistic because neither side wants Jerusalem controlled by a U.N.-type arrangement," said Jonathan S. Paris, a fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York. "Israel says that the Old City is too small to be partitioned. It has Jewish holy sites. 'We'll give access,' they say, but they want to retain sovereignty."

Some observers, based on the leaks coming from Camp David, believe that Barak may be willing to even grant autonomy to parts of East Jerusalem, if not complete sovereignty.

"I don't think Barak would be unwilling to do that, again, in terms of whether this is permanent," said Divine. "I assume that if Barak can get something that appears to be a concrete statement that the conflict is over, he can sell it to 60 percent of the Israeli people."

"Judging from the leaks, it appears that the Israelis are not objecting to the symbols - flying Palestinian flags," she said. "But both sides are using the press as a way of pressuring the other side, so it's a little difficult to judge what to believe."

Current negotiations have shown that the leaders of the two peoples can work together, but, if and when a peace deal is struck, violence may be inevitable, she said. After the historic 1993 Oslo accords granted some Palestinian autonomy in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, deadly fighting broke out.

"On the leader-to-leader level, the conflict is going to be resolved," Divine said. "What that's going to mean on the people-to-people level, it's not clear."