Sen, Jacob K. Javits (R.NY), strongly critical of the new Israeli settlements in areas under her control, appealed to the American Jewish community last night to assist Israel in her search for peace. “It is absolutely correct to point out to Israel that new settlement of these areas cannot be permitted to change what ultimately may be their disposition,” Javits said. He added, “In these new settlements the Israelis are strictly on their own.”
Addressing the American Jewish Committee’s 70th annual meeting here, Javits said that the United States must make it clear that the settlement issues “will not make a difference” in U.S. policy. He said that “the new Israeli settlements in the West Bank and other administered areas” are “the most serious symptom of the current tensions between Israel and the bordering Arab states, Israel and the United States government, and even Israel and some of her does friends in the United States.”
Javits said that “The American Jewish community can and must play a forceful role in assisting the Israelis to emulate in the search for peace the bold risks that they have so successfully assumed in war. It is time to offer new alternatives, new perspectives and new possibilities.”
OFFERS 6-POINT PROGRAM
He offered a six-point program that included Israel offering “yet again to sit directly across the table from her Arab neighbors in return for the neighboring Arab states explicitly accepting Israel’s sovereignty.” Emphasizing that “there is a Palestinian nationality because the Palestinians–including those on the West Bank–express it” Javits urged a solution whereby the Palestinians “can assert themselves as an entity.”
In this connection, he suggested a Jordanian confederation with the West Bank as “a real potential.” He ruled out the PLO, saying that in his recent visit to the Middle East he became “very convinced” that the PLO offered no solution Besides its embroilment in Lebanon and “its inhuman terrorism,” Javits pointed to the PLO’s “unwillingness to come to any position where it can be taken seriously as a negotiator.”
Praising Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger’s remarks last Sunday at the Chizuk Amuno Synagogue in Baltimore that “Israel’s survival is inseparable from the future of human dignity.” Javits said that “in view of recent events, I hope Dr. Kissinger’s words signal the end of an unhappy era.”
GARRISON STATE MENTALITY
He added that some of the recent actions “seemed to reflect a lessening of commitment to the survival and national integrity of the Middle East’s only “truly democratic state.” This, he said, “contributed to a climate that has helped to create a ‘garrison state’ mentality among many Israelis,” Javits did not identify the events but he is believed to have been referring to the coolness that developed between the Ford Administration and Israel dating back to 16 months ago when Israel rejected the first Sinai agreement proposal offered to Israel by Kissinger in March 1975.
With reference to the West Bank settlements, Javits said that the U.S. should make clear “without necessarily using the stringent language of Ambassador William Scranton,”–the U.S. envoy to the UN–the U.S. policy regarding the area.
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.
