Peres: Only Return of Pre-cease-fire Status Will Satisfy Israel

A member of Israel’s Cabinet said here today that his government would not be satisfied with a confirmation by the United States that Egypt has violated the cease-fire, as charged by Israel, but will insist on restoration of the status quo ante. Shimon Peres, Minister-Without-Portfolio, spoke at a press conference here. Mr. Peres, who is returning to Israel tomorrow after visiting Latin America and the United States, came to Washington to address tonight the 56th annual convention of Hadassah, the women’s Zionist organization of America. He said Israel had approached the U.S. with its violation complaint against Egypt because “we are operating in a vacuum and the American peace initiative is filling that vacuum for the time being.” He would not describe the nature of Israel’s evidence against Egypt but remarked, “If we had no evidence we wouldn’t say so.” He said that to his knowledge, the U.S. has not responded so far to Israel’s statement except to say it is studying it. Mr. Peres said that the violation was bringing the missile sites closer to the Suez Canal how they get there is a secondary matter. The Israeli minister said. “We have a cease-fire but we don’t have peace and the road to peace is long and complicated.”

Mr. Peres said the American cease-fire was achieved because all the parties concerned were interested in it but not all of them have altered their basic intentions. Mr. Peres claimed that Soviet Russia has not given up its ambition to dominate the Middle East and Egypt has still not agreed to the idea of a full-fledged contractual peace agreement. Asked about press reports today which quoted unidentified high U.S. officials as saying the Mideast peace talks could get underway this coming week. Mr. Peres remarked that the report was “optimistic.” The principle that the parties to the Middle East conflict must be left to themselves to work out a peace settlement was expressed by Sen. Hugh Scott, of Pennsylvania, Republican Senate Majority Leader, in remarks prepared for delivery to the Hadassah convention tonight. Sen. Scott stressed however that the U.S. must help maintain Israel’s deterrent strength if peace negotiations are to be successful. He noted that the U.S. has given $239 million in military assistance to the Arab states. He said, “it Is essential that the U.S. carefully review its military and economic support to Israel, and I will help to see that this is done.”