Allon Does Not Consider Syria’s Refusal to Negotiate As Final

Foreign Minister Yigal Allon said today that he had informed the U.S. that Israel did not take Syria’s refusal so far to negotiate as Damascus’ last word on the subject. Perhaps, Allon said, Syria’s refusal was a tactical maneuver and the tactics would yet change. “We shall find out soon,” he said, in an apparent reference to the Nov. 30 deadline for renewal of the mandate of the United Nations Disengagement Observers Force (UNDOF). Allon was addressing a luncheon session of the “symposium on military aspects of the Mideast conflict,” hosted by Noah Mozes, publisher of Yediot Achronot and a member of the Board of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.

Allon, recently back from the UN General Assembly, said he had been informed “officially” that Syria was “not interested” in any form of negotiations with Israel. Israel, he said, remained ready to negotiate without preconditions. He said he had discerned at the UN this time, for the first time after “several unhappy years.” that the “automatic vote” is no longer “secure” for the Arab bloc.

ENCOURAGED BY RECENT MOVES

Several non-aligned states, apart from the Western bloc, had informed the Arabs that they would not support Israel’s suspension–and this had prompted the Arabs to drop that initiative. They are now launching an “indirect” attack by seeking to have Zionism condemned. But Israel’s explanations that this was a disguise for anti-Semitism is being accepted, Allon noted, adding that he was encouraged by the fact that the Arabs had so far not brought their resolution to the Social, Humanitarian and Cultural Committee (Third Committee) for a vote.

Almost all the African states that broke their ties with Israel now regretted the act. The small states still have to pay exorbitant oil prices despite their “dancing to the Arabs’ tune.” The bigger states have come to realize that by taking sides in the Mideast conflict they lost influence in the international arena and were “being taken for granted” by the Arabs, Allon said.

The Foreign Minister observed that the same applied, to some extent, to the Soviets, and that it is time for them to reassess their Mideast stance since they find themselves in the peculiar position of being a superpower that was “pushed around” by Arab extremist states.

Allon would not reveal the contents of his meeting with Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko last month in New York. He did not seem confident that diplomatic ties with the USSR would be resumed shortly. “It is up to them,” he said.