Ashraf Ghorbal, the Egyptian Ambassador to the United States, went before an audience of Jewish congregational and rabbinic leaders last night and told them that peace in the Middle East requires security not only for Israel but for the Arab states too. He said Israeli withdrawal from the occupied territories and the creation of a Palestinian state there is necessary for Arab security.
Ghorbal made his statement in a speech before the board of directors of the Synagogue Council of America (SCA) at the Carnegie Endowment Center for Peace, the first time he or any other Arab ambassador had spoken before an American Jewish group.
Rabbi Henry Siegman, the SCA’s executive vice-president who introduced the Egyptian envoy, said he had been friends with Ghorbal for several years. Ghorbal said he was friends with many other American Jews, including Rabbi Alexander Schindler, chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations.
The Egyptian Ambassador said that he met with American Jewish leaders and was appearing before the SCA not to turn them against Israel but because he felt that as Americans and Jews they were important leaders of public opinion and he wanted them to understand the Arab position in order to help promote peace in the Mideast.
RECEIVES STANDING OVATIONS
Ghorbal received standing ovations from the more than 100 persons that jammed the meeting room when he entered, when he was introduced and when he finished his speech. He was also warmly applauded when he began to speak again after he was interrupted toad the close of his address by two youths shouting “Sadat is a Nazi, Sadat is a fraud.”
One of the two, Victor Vancier, of New York, almost reached the podium before he and his companion, Randy Medoff, of Hartsdale, N.Y., were ejected. The two, who said they belonged to a recently formed ad hoc group called Jewish Committee of Concern, waited outside for Ghorbal to leave to again shout at him.
Asked by a reporter for his reaction, Ghorbal commented, “No one has a monopoly on extremists.” In continuing his talk after the two were ejected, Ghorbal departed from his text to say “If I touched the sensitivities of some, I hope it is understood my coming here is meant to stretch a hand of peace and not a hand of war.”
The diminutive 52-year-old Ambassador said that Egyptian President Anwar Sadat does not need any defense. “We seek not to destroy Israel, we are at odds with our Arab brothers because we seek peace with Israel,” he declared. He said the issue is not politics “but to educate people to live in peace and harmony.”
Ghorbal said that when former Israeli Premier Golda Meir told Sadat she wants to see peace in her lifetime she spoke “for all in the Middle East who have known war.”
Ghorbal noted that in 1945 he took a trip by train and bus from Egypt to Lebanon and Syria with stops in Haifa and Jerusalem. He said he would like to make that trip again and wouldn’t mind if an Israeli visa was stamped on his passport.
SADAT SEEKING ‘TRUE PEACE’
In his prepared text, Ghorbal said that for years the Arabs wanted peace but it was only when Sadat went to Jerusalem the “wall of suspicion” came down. “President Sadat did not go to Jerusalem to conclude a partial or separate settlement with Israel, ” Ghorbal said. He said Sadat went “to prove what we say, ‘Here is our hand. We stretch it out in peace. Take it, but give us true peace in return.'”
Ghorbal said that unless Israel withdraws from the occupied territory it will not have security. He said for the same reason a Palestinian state is a “must” for peace. “To say that the Palestinians remain where they are and become nationals of their host countries is to vote against the Israeli Law of Return,” he declared. “One cannot prescribe to others what one would not apply to oneself.”
Ghorbal stressed the upcoming Cairo meeting “will lay the foundation for a meaningful resumed Geneva conference which, in turn, would build the structure of total peace in the Middle East.” He said he was hopeful that the visit by Secretary of State Cyrus Vance to the Mideast will persuade other Arab countries to join Sadat’s initiative.
Ghorbal in response to a reporter’s question, later said he believed the PLO should be brought into the Geneva negotiating process. He said all parties to the Mideast dispute should be included so that they will be committed to seeking peace.
SUGGESTS NOBEL PRIZE FOR SADAT
Rabbi Saul Teplitz, the SCA’s president, in welcoming Ghorbal, said it was fitting that his first address to a Jewish group was the SCA which he called “the harmonious spokesmen of the religious community of American Jewry.” He noted that Sadat’s visit to Jerusalem had been a “spiritual venture.”
Ghorbal had watched as the Chanukah candles had been lit and the audience sang the blessings. “It isn’t the military victory we celebrate but the spiritual victory of the Maccabees,” Teplitz said.
Rabbi Arthur Lelyveld, the SCA’s first vice-president, in thanking Ghorbal for his address, said Sadat should receive the Nobel Peace Prize. Lelyveld stressed that American Jews believed that forming Mideast policy should be left for Israel and Egypt to be worked out. But he noted that the SCA members were not only religious leaders but also Zionists because Judaism is based on the redemption of Zion.
Siegman, in introducing Ghorbal, noted that the Egyptian Ambassador was one of three envoys from Moslem countries that had helped negotiate the release of hostages held by members of the extremist Hanafi Moslem sect in the B’nai B’rith headquarters and two other Washington buildings last March. He noted that no matter how bad the situation, Ghorbal is a man who never forgets that behind the diplomacy “are real live human beings, Jews and Arabs, who grieve at the loss of their loved ones and rejoice at the hope of peace.”
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.
