Special to the JTA Report That a Number of Leading U.S. Jews Will Urge Begin to Show More Flexibilit

A number of leading American Jews, known for their strong support of Israel, are expected to tell Premier Menachem Begin of Israel this week of their deep concern about the deteriorating relationship between American Jewry and the White House and they will privately appeal to him to show greater flexibility in his negotiations with Egypt.

The appeals to Begin are being planned entirely in private in order to avoid playing into the hands of anti-Israeli and anti-Jewish forces in the United States and abroad, it was learned here from authoritative sources.

Above all, the personalities involved wish to prevent the emergence of a split within the leadership of the American Jewish community itself. However, it is understood that they will candidly advise Begin against too close a relationship with Rabbi Alexander Schindler, chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, according to the sources. It is felt, the sources said, that Schindler has lost favor in the White House due to his reported personal criticism of Zbigniew Brzezinski, President Carter’s National Security Advisor, Begin will be told.

According to this assessment of the Washington scene, American Jewry’s clash with the Carter Administration centers on the latter’s bid to sell sophisticated F-15s to Saudi Arabia in a package which also includes military aid to Israel.

However, the Israeli cause will be harmed in the United States, whether or not Congress authorizes the Saudi deal. If the deal goes through, Israel will be threatened militarily, it is felt. If it is blocked, Israel’s American supporters will face the backlash of a disgruntled Administration.

The most that can be hoped for in the short term is to win a moratorium of about five months during which the entire Middle East situation might be transformed by a diplomatic breakthrough in the Israeli-Egyptian negotiations. The Administration has expressed readiness to permit such a delay, assuming Israel is cooperative.

The sources noted that the position has been made more delicate by American Jewry’s discovery that, in the eyes of the Carter Administration, it has become a less weighty factor then the U.S. need to remain on good terms with oil-rich Saudi Arabia. Brzezinski in particular is believed to have advised President Carter that the Saudi arms deal is the best issue on which to come to grips with the pro-Israel lobby.

ALLUSION TO MANDATE PERIOD

Meanwhile, there is a feeling that American Jewry faces a situation comparable with that faced by British Jewry in the last years of the Palestine Mandate, when the Jews of Palestine and the Zionist movement were fighting for free immigration against the might of the British Empire.

In urging Begin to be more forthcoming over negotiations with Egypt, his would-be advisors will reportedly seek to compare Israel’s position with that of the United States over Vietnam, in the sense that the bargain which could have been struck earlier in the conflict was better than the one available later in the conflict. As for the danger of an “opposition” emerging in American Jewry, this is not seen as imminent. But the lesson of Vietnam was that insignificant campus protest movements can snowball into something far stronger in a remarkably short time.

Anti-Semitic elements, too, like the Ku Klux Klan and the American Nazis are also suddenly reappearing, nourished by the prospect of a real open divisive clash between America and the Jewish State, it is expected the Jewish leaders will tell Begin.

(According to reliable sources in New York, the delegation to see Begin is expected to include Theodore Mann, chairman of the National Jewish Community Relations Advisory Council, Burton Joseph, chairman of the Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith, Howard Squadron, president of the American Jewish Congress, Richard Maass, president of the American Jewish Committee, and other leading officers of these organizations.)