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U.S. Embassy in Jordan Refuses to Act for U.S. Jewish Citizen

August 10, 1953
See Original Daily Bulletin From This Date
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The U.S. Embassy in Amman, Jordan acquiescing in Arab prejudice against Americans of Jewish faith, according to formation received by Sen. Herbert H. Lehman. The Senator has asked S###### of State John Foster Dulles for an explanation.

Mr. Dulles was requested to give his “justification of the attitude taken American Embassy in Jordan in declining to make inquiries on behalf of a###### citizen merely because the citizen happens to be of the Jewish faith.”

The Embassy’s attitude was revealed in a letter it sent in connection w###### quiry from Elliott L. Biskind, a New York attorney. Mr. Biskind and me###### his family are heirs to real estate in the portion of Jerusalem now occupied Jordan. He inquired through U.S. State Department channels about inform###### what steps he might be able to take to register the property in the names ###### ful owners.

In response to his inquiry, Mr. Biskind received a copy of an official written by the American Embassy in Jordan declining to “make either for###### informal queries as to the possibility of recording the property of individual Jewish faith in Jordan.” The Embassy said it did not “deem it appropriate to aid “individuals of the Jewish faith” because it took “in view” the “parties violent anti-Jewish feeling prevailing at the present time in Jordan.”

Sen. Lehman wrote Mr. Dulles that he recognized the necessity of pr###### the best possible relations with Jordan but did not think “those relations s###### cultivated at the expense of the legitimate rights of American citizens.” ###### said “it should be repugnant to our diplomacy to tolerate or give comfort minations among American citizens in such matters as this.”

In his letter describing the events, Mr. Biskind said what concerned h###### bably more than the position of the Jordan Government, is the matter-of-###### in which the American Embassy accepts, and apparently acquiesces in that Mr. Biskind pointed out that the matter pertained not only to property to ###### and his brothers are heirs but “additional real property in the Jerusalem has been, and is, registered in the name of an aunt of mine who also resident United States and who has neither lived in nor visited Israel or Palestine time.” He said the initial inquiry referred also to her property.

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