King Faisal, of Saudi Arabia, is shaping up as the main stumbling block to the efforts of Jordan’s King Hussein to get all Arab heads of state to agree on a coordinated policy toward Israel and is holding out for the failure of the Jarring mission before he will make any commitments, London newspapers reported today.
The Times, in a dispatch from Beirut, said that Faisal is obsessed with the Communist threat but unmoved by the plight of Jordan. He is anxious to see the mission of U.N. peace envoy Gunnar Jarring terminated “lest it legitimize the surrender of Islam’s holy places in Jerusalem.” According to The Times, Faisal told a recent visitor that Russia would never permit an Israeli withdrawal from occupied Arab territory even if a withdrawal were negotiated.
The London Daily Telegraph reported that King Hussein tried to persuade Faisal to drop his objections to an Arab summit conference during the “meeting of kings” at Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, with King Faisal and King Hassan, of Morocco. “Faisal has said that he is not prepared to attend a summit conference until the Jarring mission is declared a failure,” the Telegraph said. Hussein, meanwhile, is trying to get the Arab states to accept Joint responsibility for the activities of Arab guerrillas against Israel.
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