Life Magazine has called on the Nixon Administration to find “more hopeful avenues” toward a Middle East peace “than a simplistic and automatic backing of Israel, or nursing a new naval belligerence of our own.” In the lead editorial of its Nov. 22 edition, the magazine also urged the restoration of U.S. diplomatic relations with Egypt and a general strengthening of American-Arab ties.
According to Life, the Middle East is a region ripe for application of “the American talent for assistance in economic development” which “in time could help heal the Arab weakness and disarray which, rather than Russian trouble-making, is the root cause of Middle Eastern instability.” Life believes that President Nasser of Egypt “would welcome a little assistance and cooperation from the U.S., if only to lessen his heavy dependence on Russian aid.”
Life criticized the pro-Israel statements by both Vice President Hubert H. Humphrey and Richard M. Nixon during the election campaign because they confirmed “Arabs in their illusion that American policy in the Middle East is dictated by Zionist sympathizers.” The Johnson Administration’s “policy of restraint, which seems about to yield to Israel’s request for 50 Phantoms, makes Nixon’s promise (to arm Israel) seem all the more incautious,” the editorial said. “Premier Eshkol of Israel… has had no serious complaint about Johnson’s policy but seems even more cheerful about what he hopes Nixon’s will be.”
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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.
