Additional Aid for Israel Seen

The House Foreign Affairs Committee is expected to support an additional $200 million for Israel in military assistance and approve an additional grant of $260 million in economic aid to replace a credit for that amount. Representative Dante Fascell (D.Fla.) indicated publicly at a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing last Friday, dealing with the U.S. vote March 1 in the UN Security Council for an anti-Israel resolution, that Israel would receive $1.4 billion in the fiscal year starting Oct. 1, if pending legislation is approved.

The Carter Administration’s original proposal for legislation provides for $1 billion in military aid of which one half would be forgiven and $785 million in economic supporting assistance of which two-thirds would be a grant. Since then the Carter Administration has boosted the military assistance to Israel by $200 million in credits. Members of the Foreign Affairs Committee then proposed that the military aid be increased to $1.4 billion and that the original $500 million that is to be forgiven stand in fact. This is to avoid a deficit in the defense spending proposed by the Administration.

On the economic support fund, these members have now proposed that the entire $785 million be a grant with no part of it to be a loan. In effect, this means that Israel would receive an additional grant of $260 million in economic aid if pending legislation is approved.

The Jewish Telegraphic Agency was informed that the funding in this form will be helpful to Israel which is facing a tight cash flow crisis but, at the same time, would not create an undue impact on the tightened U.S. federal budget which the President has proposed in general terms to the Congress.

The Committee is expected to vote on the revamped assistance program for Israel sometime this week as a first step in the legislative process that requires authorization and then appropriations measures by both Houses of Congress and the President’s approval of both.