The Palestine Conciliation Commission, which was instructed in a resolution adopted by the General Assembly last year to press for implementation of a clause in an old 1948 resolution, interpreted by the Arab states as calling for Israeli admission of the Arab refugees, reported today that now is not the right time for initiating any new political endeavors toward settlement of “the Palestine Question.”
Last year’s measure had referred to the controversial Article 11 of the 1948 draft which, Israel has always maintained, gives the Arab refugee no “right” for “repatriation” to the Jewish state. In its report to the U.N. member states today, the PCC stated that the time was not ripe for undertaking the mandate mentioned in last year’s resolution. Authoritative sources on the Israeli delegation here said, in answer to inquiries, the PCC report was “realistic.”
On the diplomatic front, Israel’s Foreign Minister Abba Eban conferred this weekend with Andrei Gromyko, Foreign Minister of the Soviet Union, and Rumania’s Foreign Minister Cornelia Manescu. Previously, he had met with Adam Rapacki, Foreign Minister of Poland, Mr. Eban’s talk with the three statesmen from the Soviet bloc countries, it was said, “took the form of useful exchanges of views on international and Middle East problem” and on Israeli relations with the governments represented here by the three foreign ministers. Each talk lasted an hour.
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.