Moshe Arens, chairman of the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Security Committee, said that he met last week with Sen. Charles Percy (R. III.) and discussed with Percy-reports that the salon had called for the establishment of a Palestinian state to be headed by Palestine Liberation Organization chief Yasir Arafat.
Speaking at a press conference here last Friday, Arens said he was told by Percy, who is scheduled to become chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, that his remarks regarding a Palestinian state were not coordinated with President-elect Reagan or his advisors. Percy, Arens added, also said that his remarks were made at a meeting with Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko and not, as had been reported in the press, with Soviet President Leonid Brezhnev.
Arens has been in the United States for the past two weeks to meet with members of the next Administration and Reagan’s transition team. Among the people he met were Vice President-elect George Bush and former President Ford. Arens said the general feeling in Israel is that the Reagan Administration will bring the relationship between Israel and the United States even close than it has been so far.
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.
