SANE, a Washington-based group that describes itself as “a citizens’ lobby working for East-West disarmament,” has urged the Arab, Communist and Third World governments to abandon their moves aimed at expelling Israel from the United Nations. In letters to the UN Ambassadors of the nations seeking Israel’s ouster, SANE co-chairmen Seymour Melman and Rep. Andrew Young (D. Ga.) called on them to reject such a move and pursue instead “political solutions based on common interests in the Middle East and elsewhere.”
The letter warned that the expulsion of Israel would encourage the pursuit of military options; aggravate the arms race in the Middle East; lead to withdrawal of U.S. financial support from the UN and “lead to the further erosion of the United Nations at a time when the world needs stronger international institutions.”
“We are writing as a citizens’ organization which has worked since 1957 against the militarization of our government’s foreign policy, to urge at this time of delicate diplomacy that your government help promote a peaceful political settlement of the conflict in the Middle East,” the letter to the UN envoys said.
The SANE letter warned that “The expulsion of Israel from the UN would start a sequence of events which could lead to the further erosion of the United Nations….Logic compels pursuit of political solutions based on common interest in the Middle East, as elsewhere. We trust that your government agrees and will apply that logic to the search for a peaceful settlement.”
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.
