The United States has not committed itself to “separate funding” to Israel in compensation for the oil she will no longer obtain from the Sinai wells that are being given back to Egypt, Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger said today.
Israel’s loss of the oil will be taken into account in the aid package which Kissinger expects to present to Congress before the end of September, the Secretary told a news conference. He also said there is “no precise sum” involved. There had been reports that Israel would receive $300 million in compensation.
On the U.S. “reassessment” of its Middle East policy that was begun after Kissinger’s shuttle failure in March, the Secretary said that the “diplomatic framework” was settled by the recent agreement and that “similarly the problem of aid levels was substantially settled.” He admitted that “both of these issues clearly were related to each other.”
Kissinger also said today that there is no “significant” difference in the amounts of aid between what would have been presented before the agreement and in the forthcoming package. In this connection, he noted again that 76 Senators last May had demanded supplying Israel with adequate funds. The thinking had been in May and before the agreement, however, that Israel would get aid but a minimal amount if it did not go along with a second accord in the Sinai agreeable to Egypt.
FULL DISCLOSURE PROMISED
Kissinger promised “fullest disclosure of the diplomatic record” of the second Egyptian-Israeli agreement. He pointed out he is working with the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and will do the same later with the House International Relations Committee on what “forms” can be made public of the “undertakings.” He said that members of the Senate Panel have gone over the negotiating record.
It is understood that they are chairman John Sparkman (D.Ala.) and Clifford P. Case (R.NJ), the Committee’s senior Republican. Kissinger indicated, however, that all the records will not be made public. “There is an area of diplomacy no country has ever made public,” he said.
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