Latin American Govts Urged to Move Their Embassies to Jerusalem

A call to all Latin American governments to establish their embassies in Israel in Jerusalem, “Israel’s capital and the world’s capital,” is one of the highlights of the “Declaration of Montevideo” signed at the Pan-American Jewish conference here by a group of leading Latin American non-Jewish personalities in governmental and cultural fields. Among the signatories were well known figures from Argentina, Uruguay, Bolivia, Chile, Paraguay and Peru.

The Declaration stresses support of the State of Israel and asserts that as a democracy Israel is entitled to the “material and spiritual protection of the democratic countries.” It protests the refusal of democratic countries to provide Israel with the “legitimate means for its defense” while at the same time Israel’s enemies are supplied with weapons meant to be used in aggression. Finally, the document calls on all free men and all democratic countries to rally to the cause of peace in the Middle East, asserting that a peace settlement between the Arabs and Israelis will be a “decisive factor for peace throughout the world.”

Meanwhile, Uruguayan President Dr. Alberto Zuviria received yesterday a delegation from the conference composed of Dr. Nahum Goldmann, chairman of the Jewish Agency executive and president of the World Jewish Congress, Brig Moshe Carmel, Israel Minister of Transport, and Dr. Arieh Kubovi, Israel Ambassador to Uruguay, President Zuviria expressed Uruguayan friendship for Israel and said he hoped that Uruguay’s recent transfer of its Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, in recognition of that city as Israel’s capital, would be accepted as an example by other countries. He further expressed the hope that the aims of the conference would be achieved.

MONTEVIDEO PARLEY PROTESTS AMERICA’S “DE FACTO BLOCKADE” OF ISRAEL

The conference, before it closed, sent a protest to the United States and Britain against the “de facto blockade” of Israel resulting from their refusal to provide Israel with defensive weapons while simultaneously supplying the Arab states with offensive weapons and thus inciting them in their aggressive policy. The parley charged that the “Arab feudal world is fomenting aggression and endangering peace in the Middle East.”

During the conference two parallel parleys were held here: a Latin American youth conference and a Latin American Zionist meeting. The young people resolved to mobilize Jewish youth on this continent to spend at least a year in Israel serving the interests of the Jewish State. The 400 delegates demonstrated ample enthusiasm for working in Israel’s behalf.

At the meeting of Zionist leaders, Dr. Nahum Goldmann presented a detailed report on the state of the world Zionist movement and offered a number of suggestions for improvements in the structure of the organization. He recommended abolition of the shekel system of apportioning representation, at World Zionist Congresses, insisting that the original purpose of the shekel system had been lost and that it had become an instrument for the formation of political combinations.

He further suggested that Israel Zionist movement be restricted to 40 percent of the total representation at world congresses, that the Zionist executive be empowered to allocate representation on the basis of Zionist activity within each national movement and that the Actions Committee and the Jewish Agency be reorganized to give representation to non-Zionists in the New York branch of the Agency. Dr. Goldmann proposed the establishment of a Jewish Agency department in Europe.

Speaking of the function of the Zionist organization, he asserted that it has a right to existence only as an instrument of immigration to Israel, to promote pioneering and education and to strengthen Jewish life locally. He maintained that partisan political handling of all questions before the Zionist movement consumed too much of the energy of the Zionist movement and intensified internal friction.