Dulles Statement on Saudi Arabia Continues to Evoke Jewish Protests

Major Jewish organizations today continued to assail Secretary of State John Foster Dulles for linking the exclusion of U. S. Jewish personnel at the American base in Saudi Arabia to the fact that the City of New York ignored the recent visit to this country of King Saud and refused to greet him.

Secretary Dulles was also criticized in editorials in the New York Times, New York Post and other American newspapers, while Mayor Robert Wagner of New York termed Mr. Dulles’ statement ”ridiculous.” A spokesman for the Mayor said: ”The ban against Jewish servicemen has been in effect for years. It is ridiculous to say that the fact the New York had no reception for King Saud caused the continuation of the ban.”

The American Jewish Congress, in a statement issued through its president Dr. Israel Goldstein, expressed its ”shock” at Mr. Dulles’ explanation for the Administration’s failure to end anti-Jewish discrimination at the American airbase in Saudi Arabia. It condemned Mr. Dulles’ ”explanation” as ”inconsistent with the facts that are known to Secretary Dulles himself.”

Dr. Goldstein pointed out that ”Americans have a right to expect that the State Department will not drop this matter, but will continue publicly to request of King Saud a cessation of anti-Christian, anti-Jewish and anti-Negro discriminations which are in violation of the principles of the United Nations of which King Saud’s country is a member.”

Henry Edward Schultz, national chairman of the Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith said that the statement made by Secretary Dulles ”seemingly admitted that American principles of morality are not strong enough to stand up to prejudices of a despot whose petty kingdom still countenances human slavery. ” Asserting that most Americans reject the clause which permits Saudi Arabia to set up a religious criterion for American soldiers assigned to air base, Mr. Schultz said that the Dulles statement was ”incredible” and that ”our failure to recognize and condemn the real guilt of King Saud is distressing in the extreme.”