Quaker Study Attacks U.S. Zionists for Hard-line Pro-israel Government Stance

The American Friends Service Committee, in a 20,000 word study on the Middle East situation, has attacked American Jewish organizations for consistently following a hard-line pro-Israel government approach toward the Mideast crisis and warned that this attitude is likely to result in an anti-Semitic backlash and create a conflict among religious groups in the United States. The nine-member commission of American, British and Canadian Quakers, which released their initial analysis today following two years of travels through the United Arab Republic, Israel, Jordan and Lebanon, concluded that Israel must take the initiative toward peace by committing itself to pulling out of the occupied territories and that the Arabs must then “recognize Israel’s territorial integrity within agreed-upon boundaries.”

The study, to be issued next month as a book entitled “Search for Peace In The Middle East” contended that “it is impossible to be both pro-Jewish and pro-Arab.” It observed, “We believe that to ignore or deny the essential rights of one group will lead to the ultimate destruction of the rights of the other,” The study calls the UN Security Council’s 1967 cease-fire resolution “the most practical and acceptable basis for achieving a peaceful settlement”; recommends emergency UN peace-keeping forces in a demilitarized buffer zone “removable only by a Security Council vote”; calls for a UN conference of all Mideast arms suppliers; and contends that the Big Four should push for peace talks “through suitable intermediaries” because direct negotiations are not possible.”

DR. WEXLER: REPORT’S ASSERTION OF JEWISH INFLUENCE IN U. S. IS ‘PATENT FALSENESS’

In their study, the Quakers criticized American Zionist leaders for “a tendency…to identify themselves with the more hard-line elements inside the Israeli Cabinet…and to ignore the dissident elements in and out of the Israeli government that are searching for more creative ways to solve the Middle East problems.” Answering this charge and the warning of an anti-Semitic backlash, Dr. William Wexler, chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, declared: “After reading the report, with its innuendoes of anti-Semitism, backlash and the threat of interfaith disharmony, I can only say that with such Friends who needs anti-Semites?” Dr. Wexler said he agreed with only one statement in the report, that which “concedes that American Jews, as free citizens, have the right to use the instruments of a free society to register our convictions and desires. We cannot agree with the Quaker assertion of great Jewish influence in the United States. Its patent falseness is attested to by the American government’s policy in the Middle East. Jews, as all other Americans, are primarily interested in peace everywhere including the Middle East. We represent no one but ourselves – neither the American government nor the Israeli government nor those who disagree with the Israeli government. We are concerned with the long term fate of Israel.”

The Quaker report also proposed that both Arabs and Israel recognize the Palestinian right to self-determination; that the Gaza Strip and the West Bank be at least temporarily internationalized; and that Jerusalem be unified, demilitarized and divided into UN-administered Jewish and Arab boroughs prior to federalization. It stressed the need to include representatives of the Palestinian Arabs in the final negotiations and noted that settlement must also include resettlement and compensation for both Arab and Jewish refugees from each other’s nations. Before a settlement can be reached, the report stated, the UN must seek to end the current conflict. The Big Four, it continued, must declare their readiness “to underwrite a peace settlement agreed upon by Israel, Jordan and Egypt and negotiated in consultation with the Palestinian Arabs.” Dr. Wexler assailed this as “pro-Arab propaganda” and declared that “Arab refugees are the victims of Arab warlords who have been using them as political foils. They are not victims of the Israelis.” The nine-member commission was delegated by the American Field Service, the humanitarian arm of the Quakers. The report was edited by Landrum R. Bollong, president of Earlham College, Richmond, Indiana.