State Department spokesman Robert J. McCloskey said today it was “highly unlikely” that Assistant Secretary Joseph J. Sisco and Arab-Israel Country Director Alfred L. Atherton will go to Egypt after ending their diplomatic visit to Israel. Sisco “did not go to Israel with the intention of making Egypt his next stop,” McCloskey said. But he did not rule out the possibility, recalling that Sisco’s decision to return to Egypt during his Middle East mission in May was made “literally the night before.” McCloskey stressed that the State Department has not ordered Sisco to go to Cairo after his current Israeli tour. Nor, he continued, is the Assistant Secretary carrying any American proposal “which we would expect the two sides to sign…that have to be accepted or rejected.”
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