Legislation introduced by Sen. Charles McC. Mathias to repeal the 1957 resolution on the Middle East will not affect the current situation in that area or the Israeli-Arab balance of power, his office has assured the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. The Maryland Republican presented his bill last Thursday as one of four “to clear the slate of special authorizations for specific crises that have passed,” staff aide Samuel Goldberg said. The other three bills concern the 1962 Cuban missile crisis, the Straits of Formosa and the Tonkin Gulf incident. The 1957 Mideast resolution approved economic and military aid to Mideast countries and authorized U.S. armed force if necessary to “preserve the independence and integrity” of its states. President Dwight D. Eisenhower relied on this in the Lebanon crisis. Recognizing that it “may be legitimately asked if repealing those resolutions will in any way affect existing national commitments,” Mathias cited, in a Senate speech, a recent State Department opinion that the administration is not dependent on these resolutions for foreign policy.
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
