A top ranking American Jewish leader charged today that former President Nixon and certain White House aides were responsible for injecting into the recent debate over the AWACS sale an element “questioning the right of the Jewish lobby to fully participate in the process.”
Maynard Wishner, president of the American Jewish Committee, also accused Nixon and certain White House aides of introducing the notion that a defeat of President Reagan on the AWACS issue would trigger a wave of anti-Semitism in the U.S. Wishner, who is visiting Israel at the head of an AJCommittee delegation, will meet with Premier Menachem Begin, Foreign Minister Yitzhak Shamir and other leading Israelis to discuss U.S.-Israel relations in the wake of yesterday’s Senate vote upholding the AWACS sale.
WARNS OF AWACS CAPABILITIES
Meanwhile, Gen. (res.) Yeshayahu Bareket, former chief of Israel Air Force intelligence, warned today that the AWACS radar planes in Saudi hands would rob Israel of the element of surprise in any future war with the Arab states. He said that would be an unprecedented situation for Israel.
According to Bareket, who was interviewed on Kol Israel radio, in the event of war the Saudis would fly the AWACS over the Mediterranean or along international civil aviation routes over Egypt, making it virtually impossible for Israel to shoot them down while they monitored Israeli aerial activity.
Even in peacetime, Bareket said, planes would be able to furnish the Saudis with continuous detailed pictures of Israel Air Force training and preparedness activities.
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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.
