February 10, 1991

Senior officers said today that American field commanders had recommended continuing the allied air campaign against President Saddam Hussein's forces for at least three more weeks before a ground offensive is undertaken. Defense Secretary Dick Cheney and Gen. Colin L. Powell spent almost nine hours huddled with the commanders on Saturday, listening to appraisals of the war in the Persian Gulf that were officially described as upbeat. Officers attending the session said they debated at great length both the timing and the nature of the war's next phase.

THE summer houses built on the East End in the real-estate boom of the 1980's have at least one factor in common. They pushed out young moderate-income residents who might have volunteered for the Fire Department. The problem appears most acute in the Village of Quogue, where the number of large summer residences has doubled in 10 years, according to Chief Clifford McKennet. "It's not just the number of houses, it's the size of the houses," Chief McKennet said. Typically large three-story summer cottages line the broad streets. The Long Island Lighting Company counts 1,484 residences.

THE MIRACLE GAME By Josef Skvorecky. Translated by Paul Wilson. 436 pp. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. $22.95.

A University of Michigan cap on his head, a loaf of pungent Lebanese breakfast bread in his hand, William Ali stood by the counter at the Arabian Village Bakery here trying to explain the torment of three million Arab-Americans. "We are looking out two windows," said Mr. Ali, a 24-year-old General Motors factory worker whose father emigrated to the United States from Yemen. "We love our people here, but we love our people there, too. We're existing in two worlds, but one of the things that hurts most is how little people in our world here really know about our world there."

JEAN KAHN, a Manhattan baker, is a survivor of the real estate boom gone sour. The owner of Patisserie les Friandises, a croissant and cake shop on the Upper West Side, she has gone through four years of tenacious bargaining with her landlord. She has threatened twice to move. As a result, she said, her rent, $60 a square foot when she signed a 10-year lease in 1986, has been cut almost in half to $32 a square foot. And the tug of war continues.