Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger declared today that “allegations” that he and President Ford had privately criticized Israel in the week of the breakdown of the U.S. effort for a second interim Israel-Egyptian agreement are “myths.” The President, he said, “made a public criticism, not a private criticism when he referred to inflexibility” on Israel’s part. As for himself, he had “expressed the view that a strategy which on the whole had been agreed to with the Israeli government did not succeed.”
“The purpose has been not of criticism,” he said in an interview on the NBC-TV “Today” show with Barbara Walters, “but the purpose of making clear the general American perception” that “new decisions had to be taken by all the parties and that progress towards peace in the Middle East cannot be stopped.” Miss Walters asked: “But when you publicly or privately criticized Israel, didn’t this release President (Anwar) Sadat (of Egypt) from re-examining his policy?”
“We have asked all parties to look at their policies,” Kissinger replied, “and the allegation of private criticisms of Israel comes mostly from people who think they are helping Israel but who, in my view, are not helping Israel by making these allegations.” Kissinger said, “There are so many myths that go around” in speaking of the reported criticisms of Israel.
He also said in response to a question on what assurances Israel and other U.S. allies have that “we will keep our commitments to them” that “The President has, on several occasions, made clear–and so have I–that we will stand by our existing commitments.” Kissinger said that Congress can change “our implied obligations,” as in Vietnam, but he said “the situation in Vietnam was quite different from the situation in other parts of the world.”
He said the situation in Vietnam was “extremely controversial” and “it has not been that with respect to Israel or with respect to Western Europe and most of other alliances but Congress can certainly change any commitment we have.” Kissinger noted that “in terms of the foreign policy of this Administration, our allies and friends have no reason to fear that we will abandon them.”
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.
