Robert Moses, president of the New York World’s Fair, rejected yesterday a demand by the American-Israel Pavilion for removal of an anti-Israel mural in the Jordanian Pavilion which Moses conceded was “political in nature and subject to misinterpretation.”
The mural shows an Arab refugee youth and his mother making an appeal to the world to help “the million of us wasting our lives in exile misery waiting to go home” and assailing “strangers from abroad” who “began buying up land in Palestine and stirring up the people. “
American-Israel Pavilion officials protested the mural to Moses, asserting that “such propaganda runs counter to the spirit of the Fair expressed in the theme ‘Peace Through Understanding’ and counter to regulations of the Fair. The pertinent regulation reads: “The Fair Corporation will not permit the operation of concession or exhibit which reflects discredit upon any state or nation. “
Moses replied that “The Fair cannot censor the mural you refer to, even though it is political in nature and subject to misinterpretation. We believe no good purpose would be served by exaggerating the significance of this reference to national aims or attributing racial animus to it. “
Upon receiving the rejection, the American-Israel Pavilion officials unveiled at the pavilion a Davidka, a mortar that fired noise-making projectiles during the 1948 Israel War of Independence. A pavilion spokesman said that the pavilion had initially decided against display of the mortar for fear of possibly offending other countries but now would display it, although the only identification on the gun will be its name.
King Hussein of Jordan, who visited the Jordanian Pavilion during the weekend, told reporters he did not consider the mural offensive.
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.
