President Truman said today that the United States Government is supporting the United Nations on Palestine. Asked at his weekly press conference about a disposition to soften the decision for partition, the President reiterated the American policy of supporting the U.N., adding that that was as far as he could go.
The President was first asked whether he could say anything on the controversy about the American policy regarding Palestine. In reply he stated that he had no comment.
Earlier it was reported that the President, replying to a letter by Rep. Frank Buchanan, of Pennsylvania, wrote that Palestine “is now in the hands of the United Hation3 and this government is backing the United Hat ions in the settlement they have suggested.”
“Palestine has been a matter of considerable disturbance to me since the Japanese surrender,” the President’s letter read, “and I’ve been endeavoring to Bg8t the matter worked out.”
In a letter released today, Senator Francis J. Myers, of Pennsylvania, disclosed that he had urged the President to abandon America’s “so-called neutrality” policy by lifting the embargo on the shipment of arms to Palestine. Myers wrote that if the United States devotes the same determination “to finding a solution for the constabulary problem in Palestine” as it did in helping to secure the U.N. partition decision, a solution for the Palestine problem can be found.
“I am convinced,” Myers added, “that if the U.N. is not enabled to make effective the partition plan it has recommended, the entire concept of a United Nations to keep the peace is doomed and we are once again thrown into the sort of international anarchy which developed from Manchuria and Ethiopia into World War II.”
U.S. OIL INTEREST IN WILL NOT BE INFECTED BY PALESTINE UNREST, EXECUTIVE SAYS
Disturbances in Palestine will not affect the construction of the Trans-Arabian pipeline and it is expected that it will be finished on schedule in 1950, B.E. Hull, president of the Arabian American Oil Company, said in a report made public today. Because of the disturbances some construction personnel have been transferred from Syria and Lebanon to Saudi Arabia, the report states, but production has not been seriously affected since over 80 per cent of the pipeline lies in Saudi Arabia and only small part of it in Palestine. King Ion Saud has assured the company that commitments to American oil companies will be fulfilled, the report stated.
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