AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Lane Kirkland, addressing more than 400 trade unionists and their guests as “fellow Zionists,” declared last night that no American aid should go to countries that abstained from voting on the United Nations General Assembly’s anti-Zionist resolution “until they decide which side they are on.”
“The AFL-CIO has taken its stand,” Kirkland said. “We stand with Histadrut. Israel, democracy and freedom in the Middle East and we shall abide as long as it takes to prevail.” Kirkland’s remarks were given a standing ovation by AFL-CIO President George Meany and a dozen labor organization leaders attending a dinner at the Washington Hilton Hotel where Kirkland received the humanitarian award from Uzi-Bloch, Histadrut representative to the U.S. and Canada.
Israeli Ambassador Simcha Dinitz, referring to the General Assembly’s anti-Zionist resolution, said Jews, Zionism and Israel “do not need to draw credentials from the United Nations or any other body.” because their credentials are from the Bible and the persecutions the Jewish people have endured through the centuries. “No group of Communist or autocratic states can sit in judgement on Israel,” he said. “Their only common denominator is that they practice racism in one form or another.”
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.
