The American Legion, the nation’s largest veterans’ organization, made public a resolution today adopted by its national executive committee accusing Egyptian President Nasser of serving world Communism and calling upon the U.S. Government to support Israel’s rights in the Suez Canal and Gulf of Akaba as vital to basic American interests.
The Legion said the United States should “face the Arab-Israeli conflict, directly and boldly, the root of which is that some countries in the area have refused to reconcile themselves to the existence of the Israeli democracy.” It charged that Soviet success in the Middle East “is generally the doing of one man–the Egyptian dictator, Nasser–who has played the Soviet game and has become an open accomplice of world Communism.”
The Legion found it “disturbing” to observe “our own government treating this dictator as if he were a respected member of the world community, appeasing him as he violates international law and decency, particularly his outrageous disregard” of the right of Israel and all nations to use the Suez international waterway. It emphasized that it was at a loss to understand why the same pressure brought against Israel, Britain, and France “has not been applied to the dictator who has violated every law of human decency and peace.”
As long as the Suez Canal remains under “Soviet-Egyptian domination,” the Legion said this country must explore alternative oil routes from the Red Sea to Western Europe as imperative for Western defense. It was recommended that “we should push plans under private sponsorship for a pipeline from the Gulf of Akaba to the Mediterranean, for with such an alternative route we will no longer be subject to Nasser’s domination.”
The Legion called for a solution of the Arab refugee problem, describing the refugees as “political pawns to Nasser’s game.” It recommended that “a first step should be to put the Gaza Strip under UN rule so that this area would no longer be used as a base for aggression.”
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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.
