Neumann Calls for Bilateral Treaty

Dr. Emanuel Neumann, considered the dean of American Zionism, said Sunday night he favored a plan whereby the United States would formalize its relationship with Israel by a bilateral treaty “assuring Israel of full American support in any future emergency.” His statement, at an Israel Solidarity Dinner, sponsored by the Zionist Organization of America to honor Dr. Neumann on his 80th birthday, came almost 24 hours before Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger said in Peking that a mutual defense treaty between the United States and Israel was under consideration by the U.S.

Addressing more than 800 persons at the $150-a-plate dinner where he received the ZOA’s Theodor Herzl Award, Dr. Neumann stated: “Israel needs the support of a superpower to balance the undue influence of the Soviet Union threatening its very existence; and the U.S., for its part, can hardly afford to permit the Middle East to slip into the Soviet orbit or to allow the Soviet Union to appropriate such a vast and important region for its imperialist designs.”

Dr. Neumann, honorary of the president of the ZOA is a former chairman of the World Zionist Organization Executive-American Section and played a leading role in 1947 in presenting the case for a Jewish State before the UN at Lake Success as a member of the Jewish Agency delegation to the UN.

Herman L. Weisman, ZOA president, paid tribute to Dr. Neumann’s tireless efforts on behalf of the Jewish people, Zionism and Israel. The ZOA leader called on the public to come out vigorously against giving up any part “of historical Eretz Israel.” He declared: “It is not too early to say and to repeat as often as necessary that no one is authorized to bargain away any integral parts of the land of Israel which historically and Jurisdictionally belong to the Jewish people and the State of Israel, and no one is authorized to rationalize the formula of secure and defensible borders as an excuse to entertain or make such a bargain.”