Eban Cautions Against Imposing “diplomatic” Peace on Middle East

Abba Eban, Israel’s Ambassador to the United States, has called upon the United States and other great powers to give the Middle East a cushion of time in which to settle its differences rather than impose a “diplomatic” peace on the area.

Ambassador Eben, speaking before 5,500 persons at Brandeis University’s seventh commencement exercises, cautioned against any action that would evolve “a final settlement” from direct diplomatic action. ” A pattern of affirmative relations may evolve gradually out of the sheer compulsion of Israel’s manifest and immovable presence. It will not be produced by a clever formula or by a prodigy of mediation, however generously inspired,” he asserted.

Citing the position of the State of Israel at the end of its first decade, Ambassador Eben continued: “The issue now is not survival but consolidation. Unless there is a general collapse of the international order, our neighbors cannot seriously imagine that the stability and permanence of our nationhood can be destroyed. And if there were such a universal cataclysm they would share the peril with us, and lose the liberty which they have so dearly and lavishly won.

“Time is a crucial factor in diplomacy, as in all processes which depend upon the impulses of thought and emotion. Peace between Israel and her neighbors is more likely to emerge out of a prolonged tranquility than to spring from some spectacular diplomatic initiative or from the class and thunder of public debate. I doubt the wisdom of suggestions that the Great Powers or the United Nations should now drastically insist on a final settlement.”