Crisis Conclave of All Jewish Groups Proposed on U.S. Israel Policy Shift

Concern is mounting among American Jewry over what many consider to be an erosion of United States support for Israel in the Middle East crisis. Such fears were first voiced publicly in the wake of Secretary of State William P. Rogers’ Dec. 9 speech in which he proposed that Israel withdraw from virtually all occupied Arab territories in return for binding peace commitments from the Arabs. Jews were further alarmed by the subsequent disclosure of American proposals for an arrangement between Israel and Jordan which would return almost the entire west Bank, give Jordan a governing role in Jerusalem and require Israel to accept the repatriation of an undetermined number of Arab refugees.

A call for an emergency conference of all major American Jewish organizations to deal with these developments was issued this week by the United Synagogue of America, the congregational arm of Conservative Jewry. A conference was urged by Jacob Stein, president of the United Synagogue, and Rabbi Bernard Segal, executive director, in a telegram to Dr. William Wexler, the newly elected chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations. The United Synagogue is a conference constituent.

A conference delegation met with Secretary Rogers for more than two hours this week and emerged from it still “deeply concerned.” The delegation members expressed fear that the U.S. proposals would strengthen Arab and Soviet intransigence and make it even more difficult to bring the disputing parties to the conference table. Similar fears were expressed yesterday by the Union of American Hebrew Congregations, the congregational arm of Reform Judaism. Its commission on social action has distributed a memorandum to constituent lay and rabbinical leaders all over the country warning that the Nixon Administration’s Mideast policies have “evolved toward the position of the USSR” and “seriously weakened Israel’s bargaining position.”

“This has raised the grave fear that the disastrous pattern of 1956, when Israel was compelled by the great powers to withdraw from occupied lands on the basis of vague assurances which later dissolved into hollowness and renewed hostilities in 1967, might now be repeated,” the memorandum said.

The Jewish Labor Committee warned in a statement that “Israel may be faced with an implied threat of cut-off, cut-down or delay of crucial weapons shipments from the U.S. unless she buys the American policy on peace negotiations.” Charles Zimmerman, JLC president, said that “the weakening American position makes more ominous the recent meeting between President Nixon and U.S. industrialists with oil interests in Arab countries.” He said the committee “together with all those Americans who back a democratic and peaceful Middle East, urge continued support for direct negotiations between Israelis and Arabs and reject as irresponsible anything less.”