Israel-American trade reached an all-time high of $152,337,600 in 1960, compared with $144,173,900 in 1959, despite the Arab League boycott campaign, the annual dinner of the American-Israel Chamber of Commerce and Industry was told tonight.
Nathan Strauss III, president, who made the report, also presented to Baron Edmund de Rothschild, French financier and president of Transcontinental Pipelines, Ltd., builder and operator of Israel’s new 16-inch oil pipeline, the Chamber’s annual award of merit for the outstanding single contribution during the year to Israel’s economic progress.
Mr. Strauss asserted that the “threats and intimidation which the United States Government has characterized as ‘unwarranted interference in the commercial relationships of American business firms’ have failed to stem the surging growth of American-Israel economic relations.”
Trade between the two countries in the fourth quarter of 1960 also was at a record high of $41,671,300, a 21 percent increase over the total of $34,243,300 in the same quarter of 1959, the organization’s president told the dinner guests.
A breakdown of the data showed United States exports to Israel during 1960 of $118,410,900 worth of merchandise of United States origin and $6,665,800 worth of merchandise of other origin. In the same year, Israel exported $27,260,900 worth of goods to the United States.
The award to Baron Rothschild described him as carrying on “an illustrious family tradition of vision and leadership in the upbuilding of the Land of Israel through-the establishment of major economic enterprises.” The 36-year-old Baron is the great-great-grandson of the founder of the Rothschild banking dynasty, and grandson of the first Edmond de Rothschild who, in the 1880’s, was a pioneer in the resettlement of Jews in Palestine.
Mr. Strauss said that by completing the $20,000,000 Eilat-Haifa pipeline, Baron de Rothschild had fulfilled a forecast of his grandfather who in 1917, predicted “the emergence of a strong industrial Israel that would have a large port at Eilat to make Europe independent of Egypt and the Suez Canal.”
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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.
