John Scali, the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, has told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that “a cabal of Communist and Third World nations are cooking up a scheme to boot Israel out of the United Nations.” He warned that if “the plotters” fail to expel Israel, they may try to oust her from the General Assembly where the Communists and their non-aligned allies have the votes to impose “their capricious will.”
Should this occur, Scali suggested that the U.S. abstain from General Assembly proceedings. He predicted that the U.S. would veto any expulsion measure in the Security Council and that Britain and France would do likewise, Scali, who is due to be succeeded in his post by Daniel Moynihan, asserted that American public opinion, “would virtually command some kind of retaliatory action” if Israel was suspended. He added that any attempt to suspend Israel would be “an extremely reckless move.”
Congress has already suspended its contributions to UNESCO and is delaying its $30 million contribution to the World Health Organization in view of the anti-Israel moves in those two bodies. The move to try to oust Israel from the UN was prepared last month by a Third World committee meeting in Havana.
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