Prime Minister Levi Eshkol said last night that Israel would “explore all political possibilities to prevent further deterioration” of the situation on the Syrian border, but “if all these steps do not help, we shall talk to the Syrians in the only language they understand.”
Mr. Eshkol voiced that warning in an address at Tel Aviv, before a seminar of Israeli academic personnel affiliated with the Mapai Party. He went to Tel Aviv immediately after his address to the Knesset (Parliament), where he had stated that the “next few days” would be decisive in determining whether the Middle East pacification steps taken by the United Nations and the major powers would help restrain Syria’s continuing aggressions.
The Premier said that Israel’s army had been strengthened greatly in the last three years. He referred not only to Syria’s aggressions of the last three weeks but also to the three-year old Arab campaign for diversion of the Jordan River waters so as to deny Israel’s use of Jordan River waters. “Our struggle against the diversion of the waters of the Jordan River sources is not yet concluded,” he stated. “The Syrians are still holding to their diversion plans, although their preparatory work for diversion of the Jordan headwaters is taking place at sites distant from our border.”
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.
