Zionist leaders here today took issue with a statement by Garland Evans Hopkins, executive vice president of the American Friends of the Middle East, and scored him for what they termed his “threat” of anti-Semitism in connection with Zionist action in this country.
Mr. Hopkins had said that the activities of the Zionists here might lead to the raising of the question “as to was responsible for the loss of the Middle East. This is the kind of question, “he continued, “that could produce a wave of anti-Semitism in this country.”
His statement also declared that it was “the height of cynicism” to criticize Egypt for buying Communist arms, while saying nothing about Israel arms purchases from both Western and Communist countries. At the United Nations, Israel officials said that all the arms Israel has purchased for the past eight years had come from the West.
Rabbi Irving Miller, chairman of the American Zionist Council, which represents all the Zionist groups in this country, said in a statement today that “Americans of every race and creed, including responsible members of his own organization, will have been profoundly shocked by the open incitement to anti-Semitism delivered by Mr. Hopkins. “He expressed hope that “Mr. Hopkins’ provocation” will be immediately disavowed by members of A.F.M.E., which professes that its aim is to improve understanding between the peoples of the United States and the Middle East.
It is possible for American citizens–and may I remind Mr. Hopkins that American Zionists are American citizens–to have differing views about the course and conduct of United States policy in the Middle East,” Rabbi Miller said. “We believe that it is the right of members of the American Jewish community to advance the view that the welfare and security of the State of Israel serve America’s own best interests in the Middle East. Mr. Hopkins thinks otherwise; it is his right to do so. But it is quite impermissible of him to inject the threat of anti-Semitism in the United States into discussion of the issues involved in the Middle East.”
Harry Torczyner, chairman of the Z.O.A. Commission on Israel and the Middle East, said in a statement; “It is regrettable that Americans disguised as Friends of the Middle East, Inc, should add to the Egyptian blackmail of the Western world their own specific blackmail of American Jewry by threatening a wave of anti-Semitism if American Jews, in full support of the stated policies of the United States, wished to preserve peace and stability in the Middle East while these alleged Friends of the Middle East condone and thereby aid and abet the opening of the Middle East and of all of Africa to the Soviet Union and its henchmen with all of the dire potential consequences of such a move.”
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