In a speech which an Israeli spokesman promptly denounced as “the most vicious and obscene” ever delivered at the United Nations, Ahmed Shukairy of Saudi Arabia flatly rejected today Israel’s proposals for peace talks, disarmament and an Arab-Israeli non-aggression pact.
Addressing the General Assembly in reply to the address last week by Mrs. Golda Meir, Israel’s Foreign Minister, in which those basic proposals were offered, Shukairy used sharp invective against Israel, against Mrs. Meir to whom he referred as “the lady from Israel,” and against all Israeli leaders from Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion on down.
The Saudi Arabian delegate said Israel was not a state but “a gang.” He said that Israel was using the “slogan” of peace “with Nazi determination.” “Israel Nazism,” he asserted, was responsible for the alleged persecution of the Arab minority in Israel. “It is barbarism seated in gangsterism, rooted in Nazism,” he said.
Referring to the recent trial in Israel of Gestapo colonel Adolf Eichmann, he told the Assembly “Israel and Eichmann should stand in one dock for one trial for one crime and for one verdict;” Israel’s proposal for negotiations, he declared, “is an Israeli game” performed by an “Israeli acrobat.” He concluded his lengthy intervention with the following four proposals:
1. Creation of a United Nations committee to investigate the conditions of the Arab minority in Israel; 2. Establishment of a United Nations commission to implement “all” UN resolutions on Palestine; 3. Calling on the International Atomic Energy Agency, a UN body, “to inquire into the potentials of the Israeli atomic reactor”; and 4; The demilitarization of Jerusalem.
The spokesman for the Israel delegation promptly made the following comment:
“The statement by Mr. Shukairy of Saudi Arabia is without doubt the most vicious and obscene ever heard from a United Nations platform, and exceeds all limits of what should be permissible in a United Nations debate. The Israeli delegation will deal with some of the Arab speeches in due course, in exercise of its right of reply.
“It must however be said immediately that: 1. The statements attributed by Mr. Shukairy to a number of Israel leaders are complete fabrications. 2. It is strange to hear lectures about Nazism from the lips of a former colleague of the ex-Mufti of Jerusalem who collaborated with Hitler and the Nazi regime regarding plans for the extermination of Jews.”
The Israel delegation inscribed its name today for a speech in the Assembly tomorrow in the exercise of its right of reply. It was noted here by observers that Israel’s behavior on the Assembly rostrum seemed to imply a criticism of Mongi Slim of Tunisia, president of the Assembly, for failing to interrupt the Saudi Arabian’s diatribe. Assembly presidents, in the past, have frequently exercised their prerogative of shutting off debate when it became too bitter.
Delegates also noted that Mr. Slim seemed unusually charitable to Mr. Shukairy by permitting his speech “in exercise of right of reply” to run to the length of 24 pages. The normal reply statements are always very brief.
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.
