White House Diaries

Tuesday, February 14, 1984

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Mommies on her way to St. Louis—home tomorrow. This was really a busy one—Pres. Mubarak of Egypt arrived. We had a good meeting. He’s in financial trouble due to interest payments on loans from us. We’re trying to find ways to help him out. We had good discussion on the peace initiative I launched in Sept. of ’82. He’s all for it & wants us to get moving without awaiting a settlement of Lebanon. He has some good ideas about that too. An hour & 1⁄2 later King Hussein arrived & over lunch we (the 3 of us) made some progress on plans for the peace negotiations. The only “glitch” was in the farewell remarks to the press when the President was suddenly demanding the Israeli’s get out of Lebanon immediately & that we all buddy up to Arafat. We’ll be busy for awhile patching things up with Israel. It was really a shock because for hours we discussed the problems of recognizing Arafat etc. I phoned our winners (gold & silver) in the women’s Olympic ski slalom. That was a pleasure. Cabinet meeting on legal affairs including more changes in law that discriminate against women. The Easter Seal child (and family) came in with Pat Boone. The child—Stephanie was a spinal bifida baby. She is on crutches & has club feet—but she’s a little sweetheart. Who are those who would have us believe such children shouldn’t be allowed to live. Met with the new labor party leader from Eng. Neil Kinnock. We had quite a talk. I think I convinced him that I really do want peace & the elimination of nuclear weapons.