New Campus Coalition Calls for Mideast Peace Based on Justice for Jews and Arabs

The Youth Committee for Peace and Democracy in the Middle East, a newly formed nationwide campus coalition called today for “the earliest possible peace in the Middle East which does not violate the principles of justice and democracy for either Arabs or Jews.” Helen Kerszencwejg, Executive Secretary of the Committee, said that the group’s position was “not based on any ethnic or nationalist bias. It is the cause of peace and democracy, and that alone, which concerns us.” The Youth Committee has adopted a program stating that every nation in the Middle East, including Israel, has the right to exist, condemning the “Holy War campaign of many Arab governments and terrorist organizations to destroy Israel,” and characterizing Israel as “an outpost of democracy in the Middle East.” At the same time the Committee repudiated the “anti-democratic authoritarian nature” of other Arab countries, and called for democratic rule for all countries in the Middle East. The program also stated that the Arab-Israeli question must be settled free from “imposed settlements” from the “big powers” The Committee pledges to speak out against either American or Soviet attempts to force a Middle East settlement. It claims that the policy of the Soviet Union has “helped to perpetuate the Middle East crisis.”