The government today promptly denied a report in Der Spiegel that Chancellor Helmut Schmidt said he would not visit Israel as long as Premier Menachem Begin is in office. The denial was conveyed immediately to the Prime Ministers Office in Jerusalem by German and Israeli diplomats.
The swift response was in contrast to the sluggish reaction by the Bonn authorities to similar reports in the past. On previous accasions, anti-Begin remarks attributed to the Chancellor by the same news magazine were not denied for weeks or months after publication and sometimes not at all.
It was clear that both countries are now anxious to avoid a recurrence of the personal attacks on the Chancellor made by Begin before Israel’s Knesset elections last June which severely strained German-Israeli relations.
The Foreign Ministry here is also trying to prevent another affront to Israel on the basis of a report in Der Spiegel today that Foreign Minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher has postponed his projected visit to Israel. A Ministry spokesman said the visit will probably take place after the NATO summit meeting here in June. He noted that Genscher could not have postponed his visit because no firm date had been set.
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.
