Two national Jewish organizations called for an immediate cessation of the renewed mass bombing of North Vietnam. The American Jewish Congress and the Union of American Hebrew Congregations, in separate statements released here this weekend, condemned the re-escalation of the Vietnam war and urged implementation of the cease-fire agreement which seemed imminent a short while ago.
Howard Metzbaum of Cleveland, chairman of the UAHC-Central Conference of American Rabbi’s Commission on Social Action, stated that he sent a telegram to President Nixon urging him to break the Vietnam deadlock by personally going to Paris and Hanoi “as he went to Moscow and Peking, to safeguard the October draft cease-fire which both sides so painfully hammered out together.”
Rabbi Edward Klein, chairman of the AJ Congress’ Peace Committee, declared: “We are profoundly distressed by the resumption of massive American bombing in North Vietnam. Our anguish is made even more bitter because of the hopes we were encouraged to entertain that there would soon be an end to the unbearable conflict in Indo-China.” Rabbi Klein also called for the “withdrawal of all our troops from Indochina so that those Americans who are now held as prisoners of war can swiftly be returned home.”
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