Rep. Bella Abzug (D, NY) urged today that before President Ford meets Egyptian President Anwar Sadat in Salzburg, Austria, Ford should announce his support for the $2.5 billion in aid Israel has requested from the United States. She told the annual meeting of the New York Chapter of the American Jewish Committee at the Plaza Hotel that this must be done to convince Egypt that the U.S. is not wavering in its support for Israel.
Noting news reports that Sadat plans to ask Ford for funds to pay off Egypt’s $47 billion debt to the Soviet Union, Ms. Abzug said if this was true it would be “a new definition of chutzpah,” She said before the American people will provide any aid for Egypt that country must “make serious concessions for the state of peace.”
Ms. Abzug charged that the Ford Administration has labelled Israel as intransigent and declared that it is time the Administration began pressuring Egypt to take steps toward peace. She said support for Israel is strong in the Congress and among the American people but an educational campaign must continue.
Some 200 people attended the luncheon at which the AJCommittee chapter presented its Stanley M. Isaacs Human Relations Award to Manhattan Borough President Percy Sutton and Irving M. Engel, the AJCommittee’s honorary president. Peter J. Strauss, a New York attorney, was elected chapter president succeeding Daniel S. Shapiro.
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.
