Count Folke Bernadotte, the United Nations mediator for Palestine, today confirmed the unconditional acceptance by Israel and the Arab League countries of his nine-point truce plan. In a cable to Secretary-General Trygve Lie, Bernadotte reported that the cease-fire will go into effect at two A.M. Friday, New York time.
“I take this opportunity,” the mediator said in a message to the governments of Israel and the Arab states, “to express my deepest gratitude for the splendid Cooperation which has been given to me in this difficult task and my warm appreciation of the high motives which have led your government to accept the proposals of truce.”
It was considered notable in U.N. circles today that the Arab Higher Committee which, in the past, had been consulted as an “interested authority” in much the same position as the Jewish Agency, before the Jewish state was proclaimed, was not consulted by the mediator.
MEDIATOR’S HEADQUARTERS TO BE IN RHODES; U.S. SHIPS MAY PATROL PALESTINE
Secretary-General Trygve Lie, speaking at a press conference this afternoon, declared that Count Bernadotte will turn his attention immediately to the broader problem of securing Arab-Jewish agreement on a peaceful adjustment of the Palestine situation. His headquarters will be set up on the Dodecanese Island of Rhodes, a former Italian colony now administered by Greece.
Considerable importance was attached to Lie’s disclosure that Harold Evans, the U.N. appointed Municipal Commissioner for Jerusalem, will leave Cairo for the Holy City on Friday to take up his duties there. The Philadelphia Quaker has been in the Egyptian capital for three weeks now.
The first task before the mediation staff, Lie said, would be to supervise the observance of the four week truce. He revealed that Count Bernadotte is negotiating with the governments of Belgian, France and the United States to secure the use of six ###tal########## the waters of the Eastern Mediterranean. Three of the ships would be American two French and one Belgian.
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