American Zionist leaders severely criticized the State Department today for sending arms to Arab countries while refusing to permit the sale of weapons to Israel. They cited the lifting of the embargo yesterday on the shipment of the American tanks to Saudi Arabia as a case in point.
“By its latest move, the State Department has again exposed in cynical manner its hostility to Israel and it will bear the major responsibility for the disaster which its action may precipitate in the Middle East–” Rabbi Irving Miller, chairman of the American Zionist Council representing all Zionist organizations in this country, said in a statement issued here today.
“The lifting of the embargo on the delivery of 18 tanks to Saudi Arabia finally lifts the curtain on the appeasement policy toward the Arabs which the State Department has practiced these past several years under the facade of impartiality, the statement declared. “It also demonstrates in striking fashion the entire pattern of its bungling policies in that area which have led to the opening of the Middle East to communist penetration.
“While Israel’s four months’ old request for defensive arms is being shelved under all sorts of sanctimonious pretexts despite the grave peril Israel faces because of the continuous flow of Soviet arms to its enemies, American built tanks are shipped with impunity to Saudi Arabia, which is threatened by no one. The State Department’s contention that the shipment of the tanks are ‘in conformity with the policies of the United States with respect to the maintenance of peace and stability in the area, is an amazing twist of logic and a piece of wishful thinking which our State Department can ill afford at this time.” the statement said.
Dr. Israel Goldstein, president of the American Jewish Congress, today sent a telegram to President Eisenhower, Secretary of State John Foster Dulles and Congressional leaders condemning the shipment of tanks to Saudi Arabia, and calling for a bi-partisan Congressional investigation of the State Department which, “even while it was piously proclaiming a ‘no arms race’ policy was sneaking across arms to one of the sides in the Arab-Israel dispute.” Dr. Goldstein also urged the immediate granting of permission for Israel to purchase defensive weapons in this country.”
Meanwhile, large groups of Zionists today picketed the pier in Brooklyn where the freighter James Monroe was preparing to sail for Saudi Arabia with the 18 army tanks.
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