Defense Minister Shimon Peres, who has assumed the duties of Premier, said at today’s Cabinet meeting that U.S. policy toward the Middle East remains basically consistent with Israel’s policy although Arab propagandists are trying to create the impression that it has shifted.
Peres said that according to briefings he has received from Washington the U.S. still opposes participation by the Palestine liberation Organization at the Geneva conference, is opposed to a Palestinian state on the West Bank and tends to share Israel’s definition of the nature of a peace settlement and rejects the idea of an imposed settlement. Peres said the Arabs were deliberately spreading false information about alleged changes in American Mideast policy.
He also said that Israel should not bind itself to the concept of an overall settlement of the Middle East conflict. A stubborn adherence to that concept could lead to an undesirable deterioration of the situation in the region, he warned his colleagues. He said the Cabinet should postpone political debates until after the next government is formed.
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