U.N. to Vote Tomorrow on Fate of Palestine Conciliation Commission

The question of whether the United Nations Palestine Conciliation Commission should continue its existence will be decided by a vote in the U.N. Special Political Committee, which will probably be taken on Saturday. In the meantime, discussions on this subject continued in the Committee today.

Soviet delegate Semen Tsarapkin claimed that the Commission was “an instrument” of American imperialist policy in the Middle East.” He said that the Palestine question could only be settled when the United States and other Western Powers stop “interfering” in the Palestine question and other Middle Eastern affairs. He also asserted that the Western Powers regard the Arab countries as a military springboard for an attack on the Soviet Union and said that proof of this was contained in the plan for the establishment of a Middle East Command.

The Australian representative John B. Hood said that his delegation would support the joint resolution proposed by the United States, France, Britain and Turkey that the Commission continue. None of the basic facts had changed since 1948, when the United Nations established the Conciliation Commission to work out a settlement between Israel and the Arab countries, he pointed out.

The Greek view was that, in the present political climate, a Conciliation Commission would not produce results, but the Greek delegate hoped that causes of friction would disappear in time. The representative of Greece, Alexis Kyrou, recalled the “fortunate evolution” of relations between Turkey and Greece, which once had been quite strained.

Dr. Fadhil Jamali of Iraq said that the Arab states had yielded much ground since 1947 by agreeing to United Nations resolutions, while the Israelis had progressively demanded more concessions. Dr. Jamali said that the Commission had utterly failed to carry out its proper work and had yielded to “Israeli pressure.”