U.S. Plans to Start Seeking Settlement of Major Arab-israel Issues

The United States will make a new attempt to find basic solutions for Middle East problems growing out of the Arab-Israel conflict at the forthcoming UN General Assembly which opens here next Thursday, it was learned today.

This will be done through the revival of an American resolution first offered in the special General Assembly convened after Israel launched the Sinai operation. The resolution offered by U.S. delegate Henry Cabot Lodge on the night of November 3, 1956, called for dissolution of the old Palestine Conciliation Commission and the substitution of a committee to prepare recommendations, “after consulting with the parties to the general armistice agreements of 1949, regarding a settlement of the major problems outstanding between the Arab states and Israel, with a view to establishing conditions of permanent peace and stability in the area.” The special committee would consist of five members and would submit its recommendations to both the General Assembly and the Security Council.

The State Department, it became known today, has been hoping to interest either a member government of the United Nations or some outstanding world personality to undertake the task of acting as intermediary between Israel and the Arab states. Having failed until now to fix upon an intermediary who would have the mutual confidence of all the Arab states and of Israel, the State Department is reportedly willing to revive the 1956 resolution and leave the task of locating an effective intermediary to the new committee.

In general, the State Department is understood to feel that this year’s assembly will not offer the opportunity for efforts to find basic solutions to the Israel-Arab problems. However, it is said to be the hope of Washington officials that the new committee of five could start, perhaps slowly and quietly, to lay the basis for fundamental solutions of the Israel-Arab problems.