ZOA Demands U.S. Exercise Veto on UN Resolutions Harmful to Israel

The Zionist Organization of America wound up its 75th jubilee convention today with a series of resolutions directed mainly at the United States. The ZOA urged the US government “not to hesitate in using its veto” in the United Nations Security Council in order to “guarantee that justice is done to Israel.” A second resolution called for the transfer of the US Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. Herman L. Weisman was re-elected for a third consecutive one-year term as president of the ZOA.

The organization lashed out at the United Nations as unfair and biased where the interests of Israel are concerned and chided the US indirectly for having abstained when the Security Council voted June 26 to censure Israel for Incursions against terrorist bases in Lebanon. When the US only abstains with regard to a Security Council resolution with which it disagrees, it serves “neither the principles of fair play nor the peaceful objectives of American foreign policy,” the ZOA resolution said. “Unless the US exerts its influence forcefully and steadfastly in the UN, this organization will be threatened with the same fate as the League of Nations,” the ZOA warned.

The convention expressed support of President Nixon’s policy of maintaining the Middle East cease-fire and called on the US to continue its military and economic assistance to Israel and to urge direct Arab-Israeli peace negotiations. A special resolution called for UN action to demand that Arab states permit their Jews to emigrate. The convention also demanded emigration rights for Jews in the Soviet Union and called on President Nixon to use his good offices to have the Soviet government open its prison camps to inspection by non-political agencies such as the Red Cross.