Warning that Israel would not be deterred from carrying out its irrigation project by Arab threats, Premier Levi Eshkol declared in Parliament that under international law, the refusal of one party to reach agreement with another on such regional programs as the Jordan River waters development plans does not give the refusing party the right to prevent a neighbor from proceeding.
Rejecting Arab propaganda charges that the Israel irrigation project was “illegal and unilateral,” he reviewed the regional water plan developed ten years ago by the late Eric Johnston as an emissary of then President Eisenhower. In that plan, he emphasized, and agreed allocation of Jordan River waters had been determined against which the parties concerned made no objections at the technical level. He said Israel undertook to remain within the framework of those allocations “and we will honor this undertaking.”
The Premier said that Israel would tap water from Lake Tiberias, into which the Jordan Hows, “within the limits of the quantities laid down in the unified plan” worked out by Mr. Johnston. He noted that the Arab rulers, at their conference in Cairo this week, had rejected the plan, which their technicians had accepted, “on the deliberate principle of opposing any cooperation, even indirect, with Israel.” He said it was important that the world “should be made aware of the deplorable decisions” adopted at the Cairo conference.
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.
