Icao Rapped for Giving a Platform to the PLO

Yitzhak Mayer, head of the Israeli delegation to the 23rd General Assembly of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) just held here, sharply criticized that body for giving a platform to a Palestine Liberation Organization official with observer status. “My government considers the very attendance of the so-called PLO as illegal and as contrary to the foundations on which the ICAO is based, ” said Mayer, who is Consul General of Israel in Montreal.

He was referring to a two-page statement read by O.H. Murad, a PLO aviation specialist at the ICAO forum, in which he called for Israel’s “suspension” from the organization. Murad, assisted by A. Abdullah, head of the PLO’s political department in Ottawa, said Israel should be expelled because it has “usurped the rights and the land of the Palestinians” and has “declared unilaterally Jerusalem as its eternal capital, thus infringing the United Nations resolutions.”

An ICAO spokesman explained that “the PLO is permitted once in three years to present a statement to the members of the Assembly which is not submitted to the debates or to a vote of the Assembly.” But Mayer said his government rejected the “contemptuous declaration delivered by the representative of the PLO terror organization” and drew the attention of the General Assembly to the fact that “the newly invited observers misused the platform by endangering the very existence of the organization.”

Mayer noted that “an organization which has brought about modern piracy into the air and perfected the black art of aircraft hi jacking stands unabashed and unashamed in front of air navigation officials and the innocent passengers of all nations whom they serve.” The Assembly took note of both statements but there was no debate.