U.S. Zionists Charge State Dept. with Using Pressure on Israel

The American Zionist Committee for Public Affairs, official spokesman for all Zionist bodies in the United States, today charged that the Department of State has adopted a new and “obviously partisan” policy in the Middle East by “exerting pressure on Israel to offer concessions to the Arab states on the assumption that peace may be purchased,” and without any intimation that the Arabs are prepared to consider the slightest step toward negotiations for peace.

Following a meeting of representatives of all national Zionist organizations, the committee issued a statement in which it took sharp exception to two speeches on Arab-Israel relations made by Assistant Secretary of State Henry A. Byroade in Dayton, Ohio, on April 9, and in Philadelphia on May 1. The statement reads:

“A new line of policy in the Middle East has been expressed by Assistant Secretary of State Henry A. Byroade in two significant speeches in which he has urged Israel to change its immigration policy and to make other drastic concessions–all without any intimation that the Arabs are prepared to consider the slightest step toward negotiations for peace. Thus, the Department of State is now exerting pressure on Israel to offer concessions in advance to the Arab states on the assumption that peace may be purchased.

“The proposal that Israel limit its immigration to set Arab fears at rest strikes at the heart of Israel’s existence. Israel was created to provide a homeland and sanctuary for Jews. We deeply regret that an official of our great country with its own proud record of sanctuary should admonish the new-born Israel to abandon its fundamental purpose.

CHIDE BYROADE FOR ADVOCATING ARAB VIEW

“Without discussing the merits of Mr. Byroade’s proposals, we are constrained to point out that it is unprecedented for an official of the Department of State to carry on diplomatic relations with a friendly government from the lecture platform.

“But far more serious is the impression that Mr. Byroade has become thead-vocate of the Arab view that the responsibility for the present conflict in the Middle East rests with Israel and that Israel must take the initiative to bring about peace. Every objective and impartial observer of the Middle East scene knows that the fundamental cause of the continuing unrest is the refusal of the Arab states to accept the very fact of Israel’s existence and to enter into any negotiations with her. The Arab attitude, which Mr. Byroade euphemistically described as ‘negativism,’ is fortified and strengthened when the State Department becomes its apologist.

“The Department of State has been led into this untenable position because it proposes to give arms to the Arab states without any requirements that they make peace with Israel or align themselves with the Western world. It is in the attempt to justify this premature distribution of arms–a policy which threatens the peace of the region–that the Department is constrained to attribute the lack of peace not to Arab belligerence but to Israel’s refusal to pay tribute to those who blockade and besiege her and seek her destruction.

“As Americans, concerned for the integrity of American foreign policy, as well as for the survival of democratic Israel, we call upon the Department of State to reconsider its obviously partisan attitude and to renew its efforts to seek a just and honorable peace in the Middle East to be secured by direct negotiations between the parties without coercion or surrender of sovereignty.”