Knesset member Chaim Druckman, who is Deputy Minister of Religious Affairs, said here today that he is confident that Israel’s final withdrawal from Sinai will be halted. “As a member of the Knesset from the government coalition and a Deputy Minister, I can tell you that the withdrawal should and will be halted,” Druckman, a rabbi and a member of the National Religious Party, declared at a press conference at the Roosevelt Hotel.
The press conference was sponsored by an organization called Americans for a Safe Israel. Druckman arrived here today as part of a six-member delegation representing the movement in Israel to halt the final withdrawal from Sinai. The delegation will be in the U.S. for three weeks to present its view to the American public that the withdrawal, scheduled to be completed next April 26, would endanger Israel’s security and survival.
Druckman told the press conference that a petition signed by one million Israelis was completed recently, urging the government to stop the withdrawal from Sinai. Claiming that when the peace treaty with Egypt was signed in 1979 he did not believe that the withdrawal could be stopped, Druckman declared.
“But things have changed. The mood in Israel has changed. There is now a groundswell of public opinion in Israel which realizes the danger to the State and opposes further withdrawal from Sinai.”
Other participants in today’s press conference were Ella Weizman, a resident of northern Sinai who heads the delegation, and Miriam Levinger who is from Hebron. Weizman also claimed that the mood in Israel has changed and that more and more people are opposed to the withdrawal from Sinai. She said, however, in response to a question that they do not intend to use violence to halt the withdrawal. She said she believed that the growing movement against withdrawal would create the conditions to stop it.
The three members of the delegation at the press conference said that during their visit to the U.S. they intend to meet with Jewish leaders. In reply to a question by the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, they said their trip is financed by American Jews, among them Americans for a Safe Israel, Young Israel and other Jewish groups which do not wish to be identified at this stage.
They said that during their tour they will inform the American public of “multiple violations of the peace treaty by Egypt, Egyptian preparations for war, the massive arming of the Arab world and the importance of Sinai, Golan, Judaea and Samaria to Israel’s security.”
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