Premier Yitzhak Rabin told the Cabinet today that he took a very serious view of the potential erosion of American policy in the Middle East, manifested more than anything else by President Carter’s statements in favor of a Palestinian homeland. He characterized those remarks as a retrogression in American policy more serious in their implications than any possible differences with the U.S. over Israel’s final borders.
However, Rabin said, there was an important point of understanding with the U.S. on the nature of peace in the Mideast. He said his government had based its policy on readiness for negotiations to reduce the possibility of war, building the country’s strength and winning over American public opinion.
Minister-Without-Portfolio Israel Galili described recent statements by the leaders of Likud who will form the next government as ill-judged and warned that they could accelerate the already disturbing process of erosion in the U.S. which began, he said, before the elections. Health Minister Victor Shemtov of Mapam said the Likud statements have already had a damaging effect.
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