Reception by Congress to Begin, Sadat Warmest Since Churchill’s Appearance Before That Body 26 Years

The reception given by Congress last night to Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and Israeli Premier Menachem Begin was the warmest given to foreign statesmen since Winston Churchill appeared before a joint session at the end of World War II, House Speaker Thomas O’Neil (D.Mass.) said today. O’Neil offered this assessment in welcoming Sadat at his appearance before the House International Relations Committee.

Sadat and Begin appeared separately today before the House Committee and the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. O’Neil said that in his own 26 years of Congressional experience he could recall no similarly enthusiastic reception by the legislators. He had consulted with veterans going back even further than himself and they had referred to the historic Churchill visit as the only comparison.

“It echoed the sentiments of all the American people,” O’Neil assured the Egyptian leader “Congress and the American people are behind you all of the way.”

Sadat, in his opening remarks to the Committee, said the process that had been “crowned” by success at Camp David actually began in November, 1973 when he had received then-Secretary of State Henry Kissinger in Cairo for the first time. “All of us are celebrating now,” Sadat declared. “But it is your occasion as much as mine.”

In the “hard and difficult talks” which now lay ahead, the U.S. would continue to act as “full partners,” Sadat added. He noted he had pledged back in February, when he last addressed the House Committee, “never to let the American people down.” He said that by the Camp David agreements he had fulfilled his promise. The agreements would “start a completely new era in the history of our region,” he said.

The agreements would “enable us to end the suffering and the bitterness,” Sadat declared. The Congressmen stood and applauded Sadat as their colleagues in the Senate’s Foreign Relations Committee had done earlier. They then went into closed-door session to question the Egyptian President on details of the agreement.

BEGIN ASSERTS ISRAEL’S WEST BANK ROLE

Begin had earlier told the House Committee that Israeli troops would remain on the West Bank, in the specified locations, “forever.” Asked about final borders on the West Bank and Gaza, he said these would be negotiated in the four-party talks set up under the Camp David “framework for peace” agreement.

Begin stressed to the Congressmen that Israel had not given up its right to claim sovereignty over the West Bank. It would exercise that right if the issue came up for negotiation in the future. A number of the Congressmen seemed perturbed that Begin chose to stress this position so forcefully. As they crossed paths, Sadat from the Senate Committee en route to the House and Begin in the opposite direction, the two leaders met in the corridor and hugged warmly.