United States Ambassador Malcolm Toon has advised Israelis to restrain their appetite when asking for American economic and other aid, limit themselves to what is really essential and tighten their belts before making “exaggerated” requests for assistance. His advise was delivered in a Kol Israel radio interview marking the end of his first three months as Ambassador to Israel.
Toon, who participated with Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger and the American team in the exhausting negotiations that led to the second Israeli-Egyptian interim accord in Sinai last August, said he and his colleagues and the American people would have been happier if the agreement did not call for stationing American technicians in a surveillance role in Sinai.
Asked about U.S. arms for Egypt, the American envoy said the present efforts by the U.S. to gain influence in Egypt required that Egypt’s request for arms be favorably considered–up to certain limits, however. He said that Kissinger’s recent remarks before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in Washington represented America’s true position, namely that except for the commitment to assure Israel of oil, all other promises and assurances given in the framework of the Sinai accord were not legally binding on the U.S.
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.
