Eshkol, Marking Jerusalem Reunification Day, Says City Will Always Be United

Prime Minister Levi Eshkol declared here today that Jerusalem will always remain a united city and assailed the United Nations for having been silent for 20 years while the Jewish Quarter of East Jerusalem was desecrated and destroyed by Jordanians. Mr. Eshkol spoke at a special session of the Jerusalem Municipal Council marking the first anniversary, according to the Hebrew calendar, of Jerusalem’s reunification. While Israelis celebrated the occasion it was learned that the Government had lodged a strong protest with Great Britain and other Security Council members who voted for the May 20 resolution demanding that Israel rescind its measures to unite Jerusalem. The resolution, adopted by a vote of 13 to zero with the United States and Canada abstaining, was sponsored by Pakistan and Senegal. Foreign Minister Abba Eban said Israel was particularly disappointed by Britain’s vote since the chief of the British UN delegation, Lord Caradon, had spoken against the resolution before the Council voted.

The anniversary of Jerusalem’s reunification was an emotional occasion rather than one of overt display. The only official events were a prayer of thanksgiving recited at the Western (Wailing) Wall in the presence of some 30,000 persons and the Municipal Council meeting. Mayor Teddy Kollek received messages of greeting and good wishes from Mayor John V. Lindsay of New York, Mayor James J. Tate of Philadelphia, and others. Members of the paratroop brigade that liberated Jerusalem last June and their families toured the Old City to visit battle sites and hold memorials for fallen comrades. The soldiers were in mufti because of the Government’s decision to ban all military displays. But troops in encampments all over the country held ceremonial parades to mark the Hebrew calendar anniversary of the Six-Day War. On a hill overlooking the old walled city, the Jewish National Fund dedicated its new “Peace Forest,” symbolic of Jerusalem’s liberation.