Support for Israel’s efforts to protect its security along the Egyptian border were voiced here by a group of Zionist leaders on the eve of their departure after attending a meeting of the Zionist Actions Committee here. Noting that they had a “grim opportunity” to see the situation for themselves, a party of seven leaders from the United States, Canada, Britain, South Africa and Latin America issued the following statement:
“A campaign of murder and terror had been organized by Egypt, as was clearly seen from the evidence. The Egyptian press and radio heaped praise on the perpetrators (of attacks on Israel lives and property) gleefully reporting every attack against Israel, the Egyptian authorities openly claimed credit for them. We therefore believe that any free country would reply to such attacks as Israel replied.
“We believe in the overriding importance of the armistice agreements, which we witnessed Egypt undermining. Any international examination of the situation created must stem from the fundamental facts of Egypt’s assault on the armistice not on Israel’s reaction to that assault. Any other attitude would be lacking in moral validity and practical relevance to reality.”
The group also stressed that the world is concerned with peace in the Middle East and should be concerned with the root cause of the present dangerous instability there. The Zionist leaders reported that at the request of the Actions Committee the government of Israel had “generously” agreed to admit a larger flow of immigrants to the Jewish State. “As we leave Israel,” they concluded, “we extend to its people the assurance of our full understanding and determination to rally around the justice of her cause.”
The seven who issued the statement are: Mrs. Rose Halprin, member of the Jewish Agency in New York; Mrs. Rebecca Schulman, president of Hadassah; Edward E. Gelber, head of the Zionist Organization of Canada; Dr. S. Levenberg, head of the Jewish Agency in London; I. Dunsky of South Africa; J. Yaguspky of Argentina, and Leib Dultzin of Mexico.
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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.
