Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir sounded a series of sour notes on the eve of his departure for the United States.
On Thursday, he accused the United Nations of interfering in Israel’s affairs; held Egypt responsible, along with Jordan and Syria, for allowing an atmosphere of hostility toward Israel to fester; and less than two weeks before his scheduled meeting with President Bush on Dec. 11 in Washington, complained that the United States was prepared to sacrifice Israel’s interests in order to hold together its anti-Iraq coalition.
American efforts to obtain a Security Council resolution authorizing the use of force to get Iraq out of Kuwait ” is bringing in its wake dangerous plans for Israel,” said the prime minister, at the annual Editors Committee Luncheon held at the Journalists Association headquarters here.
The occasion was the 43rd anniversary of the U.N. General Assembly’s Nov. 29, 1947, resolution calling for the partition of Palestine into separate Jewish and Arab states.
Shamir assailed the United Nations for trying to investigate the killing of at least 17 Arabs by Israeli border police during the Temple Mount riots in Jerusalem on Oct. 8.
“This line of intervention in Israel’s affairs in different and strange ways, by sending delegations and ombudsmen, makes the atmosphere sour and places mines on the diplomatic road,” Shamir said.
He blamed the recent spate of attacks along Israel’s borders on what he called the general anti-Israel atmosphere in Egypt, Jordan and Syria.
“Egypt, which maintains formal relations of peace with us, has not succeeded, and maybe not even tried, to dam the wells of poisoned propaganda against us,” Shamir said.
Shamir denied published reports that his office has placed a blackout on any new peace initiative he may raise with Bush next week. “There is no censorship on ideas for diplomatic moves, that is simply not true.
“If there will be a need for new diplomatic ideas, we shall prepare them, and there are already some plans,” Shamir said without elaborating.
But he said there would be no diplomatic moves in the Middle East before there is a resolution of the Persian Gulf crisis.
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