After a week of oratory during which Israel-Arab differences impinged time and again on speeches commemorating the tenth anniversary of the founding of the United Nations here, the 60 representatives to the special UN Assembly closed their ceremonies. They adopted unanimously an Israel-sponsored suggestion that a permanent memorial be erected, marking the UN’s close association with this city, where the world organization was founded in 1945.
The suggestion, read by Dr. Eelco N. van Kleffens, president of the Special Assembly, after the last of the commemorative addresses had been delivered, was made in a letter to Dr. van Kleffens by Israel’s delegation chairman, Abba S. Eban. Without dissent or abstention, all the 60 official delegates endorsed Mr. Eban’s proposal, instructing Secretary-General Dag Hammarskjold to implement the resolution.
Mr. Eban’s closing intervention put Israel’s participation here in a positive light, after a week during which several Arab delegates tried unsuccessfully to inject their anti-Israel propaganda into the special sessions. On Tuesday, the first of the Arab speakers, Foreign Minister Khalid El-Azam of Syria, tried to attack Israel; he was gavelled down by Dr. van Kleffens. The following day, Yemen’s Prince Seiful Islam Alhassan made a further attack on the Jewish State, to be followed with similar tactics by Lebanon’s Dr. Charles Malik on Thursday.
Egypt’s Foreign Minister Mahmoud Fawzi, on Friday, pointedly avoided mentioning either Israel or Palestine, but that slack was taken up by Saudi Arabia’s Sheik Asad Al-Faqui, who told the representatives that they must assume responsibility for the “plight” of Arab refugees because they had brought about Palestinian partition.
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