There is no change in Israel’s position with regard to the Gaza and Akaba areas and no proposals on them will be submitted by Israel to United Nations Secretary General Lag Hammarskjold who has invited Israel Ambassador Abba Eban to a conference this afternoon, it was indicated here today.
What Israel expects to hear from Mr. Hammarskjold are his ideas on the steps which he plans to take to establish “a peaceful condition” provided for in the second resolution adopted by the UN General Assembly in the early morning hours yesterday. No new instructions have, therefore, been forwarded to the Israel delegation at the United Nations for today’s meeting between Ambassador Eban and Mr. Hammarskjold.
Israel rejected the General Assembly’s call to quit the Gaza and Akaba areas in a statement last night which stressed the Jewish State’s willingness to cooperate with any United Nations peace effort in the area consistent with the principles of the UN Charter
Following yesterday’s Cabinet meeting, and a bedside conference with Premier David Ben Gurion who is recuperating from pneumonia, a Foreign Ministry spokesman issued the statement declaring that “Israel adheres firmly to the position adopted by the Knesser January 22 regarding Sharm el Sheikh and Gaza. ” The Knesset resolution insisted that Israel would remain in the Akaba area until it had obtained satisfactory safeguards of freedom of navigation through the Gulf of Akaba. It also said that Israel would continue to administer the Gaza Strip in cooperation with the UN.
The Foreign Ministry statement, after emphasizing Israel’s “appreciation of the growing understanding in the United Nations” that the ”status quo ante of violence and blockade by Egypt may not be restored, expressed “regret that the Assembly failed to touch on the root of the tensions in the area, which is Egypt’s continuing maintenance of a state of war against Israel and her infringement in this connection of the United Nations Charter and Security Council resolutions.
In the interests of its own morality, the United Nations cannot ignore Egypt’s infringements of Security Council resolutions and her primary international obligations by her blockade of the Suez and Gulf of Akaba, and at the same time call on Israel to withdraw from the east coast of the Gulf of Akaba without providing adequate guarantees that the present freedom of navigation shall not be upset by Egypt. There cannot be two laws, one for Israel and one for Egypt, ” the statement concluded.
Meanwhile, Israel completed today the establishment of a network of local councils in the Gaza area by installing the members of the local council at Beni Suheila village. This is the sixth local council in the Gaza Strip.
At a formal ceremony attended by Arab notables from Gaza and other villages in the Strip. Israel’s military governor, Lt. Col. Haim Gaon, said that the Gaza area is ready to move into the stage of increased development, He noted that the Israel Government had begun action on the Arabs’ request for further development projects and would soon begin work on increasing industry and farming in the Strip.
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