War Fears Continue

Fears of a new Middle East war erupting before the end of the year continued unabated over the weekend with Defense Minister Shimon Peres declaring that the graveness of the situation “compels us to present the harsh truth to the people.” Peres said the Arab states have swung into preparation for war aided by an intensive Soviet arms supply especially to Syria and Iraq.

His remarks yesterday to a meeting of Labor Party branch leaders at Beit Berl came a day after he had charged that Soviet helicopters had violated Israeli sirspace in an attempt to photograph Israeli naval vessels and that Egypt and Syria have been violating the disengagement agreement. (See separate story.)

War warnings were also issued by Information Minister Aharon Yariv and Premier Yitzhak Rabin. Yariv said that even if Israel is ready to make major concessions to the Arab states this would not ensure peace since the major obstacle is the refusal by the Arabs to accept Israel’s right to exist. But he stressed that every opportunity should be made to reach a political settlement since there is no guarantee that another war will bring peace.

WAR MAY COINCIDE WITH UNEF MANDATE APPEAL

Rabin late last week warned that if substantive action for peace is not taken soon the danger of war will increase. He said that a possible date for the resumption of war could be in Oct. or Nov., when the mandate of the United Nations Emergency Force (UNEF) must be renewed. The Arabs, he said, may use this provision as a pretext to create a situation to force the UNEF to leave the buffer areas and thereby free their military forces to unleash another attack against Israel.

“In April, 1967, I did not believe there would be war,” Rabin told students at Hebrew University in Jerusalem and Haifa University. “I learned since that whoever tries to determine whether or not there would be a war is taking too much of a risk.” The premier noted that the next war would not be similar to the previous ones. There are no more short a and easy wars, he said. The power that each party has and the advance that each party has in the operation of certain means will create a continuous war, very different from the Six-Day War.

ROLE OF SOVIET UNION STRESSED

In his remarks yesterday, Peres said that the Arabs’ intensive military training programs, their massive arms buildups, their heightened preparations for war, the attempt to include Jordan in a Joint front with Egypt and Syria have all combined to light an alarm signal for Israel. “The Arab world now looks for war,” he declared. Peres, in stressing the role of the Soviet Union in the new situation, said the USSR is supplying the Arabs with huge quantities of arms, including the advanced MIG-23 planes, and noted that there has been an intensive Soviet sea lift to Syria in the past few days.

(Reports from Moscow reaching here say that the Soviet Union has recognized the Palestine Liberation Organization and has agreed to allow a PLO office to open in Moscow. (See separate story.)

Peres said Syria is not only talking of war but planning for it. But he said Egypt was also making threats. The Arabs hope to force Israel to fold up by these threats, Peres said, adding. “The Arabs think that by playing a militant march they can trample underfoot thousands of years of Jewish history.” But Peres stressed that Israel can defend itself and will mobilize its economy and manpower to meet the threat.

The reason that the Arabs have changed from talks of peace to war chants, according to Peres, is the continuous applause enjoyed by the Arabs throughout the world. He said the recent European-Arab economic talks were part of the development “which has brought the Arabs once more to reveries of war and victories.”