STATE DEPT. ANNOUNCES JOHNSTON’S MISSION TO ISRAEL, ARAB LANDS
The State Department announced today that Presidential envoy Eric Johnston’s aim during his forthcoming talks with Arab and Israel leaders will be to discuss the Arab and Israel Jordan River development schemes “to define points of essential agreement and, insofar as possible, to narrow the differences on technical aspects. “
Ambassador Johnston will leave by plane this Thursday. He will go first to Cairo to meet with representatives of the Governments of Syria, Lebanon, Jordan and Egypt. Following these discussions, the State Department said, he will leave for Tel Aviv for similar talks with the Israel Government. He will be accompanied by staff advisers from the State Department and the Foreign Operations Administration.
The State Department announcement said that “both Israel and the interested Arab states have given Ambassador Johnston their comments on the broad program for Jordan Valley development proposed to them last November during his first visit to the area as the personal representative of President Eisenhower.
“In addition, ” the Department said, “both the Arab states, acting as a group, and Israel, have now submitted detailed engineering proposals of their own as to how the valley’s water resources can be developed for irrigation and power. These proposals, together with those originally put forward by Ambassador Johnston, will form the basis of the forthcoming discussions at Cairo and Tel Aviv. “
During the week-end, Mr. Johnston met with President Eisenhower and received his final instructions on the plan. Later, at a press conference, the Ambassador said that the Arab and Israel proposals for regional development were “poles apart.”
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
