Shapiro Tells Ort Conclave That Carter is Using Mideast Negotiations As a Pawn in the Soviet-u.s.pow

Declaring that the current Middle East peace negotiations are only a minor factor in the rivalry between the Soviet Union and the United States for control of Asia, Africa and Latin America, Dr. Judah J.Shapiro, president of the Labor Zionist Alliance, warned Israel not to succumb to the blandishments of President Carter but to “be guided by its own tests for security.”

Addressing 500, delegates from across the country attending the National Conference of the American ORT Federation here, Shapiro said that “President Carter is not motivated by any abstract commitment to the ” self-determination of peoples’ in seeking an independent Palestine homeland.” He stated that Carter is ” rather hoping to bring Saudi Arabia, the Persian Gulf oil states, Jordan and Syria into the region of American influence and security by yielding to the Arab demand for a Palestinian state. “

Shapiro noted that the current episodes in the Middle East negotiations may obscure the larger context of what is happening in Cairo and Jerusalem. He said: “Without minimizing the significance of President Sadat’s historic visit to Jerusalem two months ago and the new encounters of Israelis and Egyptians, the developments are only the tip of the iceberg in the maelstrom of that part of the world.”

Shapiro estimated that by the end of the 20th Century, “80 percent of the world’s population will inhabit Asia, Africa and Latin America. It is over those three continents that the struggle has already begun, with the major rivals for influence and control there being the Soviet Union and the United States. The Middle East is the hinge of this rivalry which has already expelled Europe from any role in those areas.”

WASHINGTON SEEKING MASTERY

For the U.S., the Mideast is “the passage way for deliveries of oil from the world’s largest reservoir; it is the point of control of movement of ships, men and materials to Asia and down the eastern coast of Africa; it is the potential base of operations for any military action in the control of Asia and Africa, or for the extraction of the resources of those lands, ” Shapiro said.

“Washington’s hope is that it can achieve its mastery by winning the peaceful cooperation of the inhabitants of the vast regions of Asia and Africa; Moscow can only achieve entry into the area through turmoil. That difference throws its shadow over the present negotiations between Israel and Egypt, with the active participation of the United States. The Arab rejectionists who oppose and resist the peace efforts are the clients of the Soviet Union, ” he said.

The difficulties in the meeting in Cairo and Jerusalem ” do not pertain to the settlements in Sinai or the drawing of borders, but they lie in the attempts to gain for the American position in the region a wider support in the Arab world, ” Shapiro declared. “Israel must however, be guided by its own tests for its security, and while surely accepting the American to the Soviet option, it cannot yield its independence and security in the struggle of the two superpowers for the control of Asia and Africa.”