A/38/PV.89 General Assembly

The General Assembly is considering the situation in the Middle East when the region is expe- riencing grave and difficult conditions as a result of the qualitative escalation of the aggression against the Arab people and the geographical widening of that aggression. Recent developments in the Middle East show that a solu- tion to the crisis of the region and the restoration of the just peace that the international community seeks, a peace based on international legitimacy, have become more re1J1ote than ever. The dimensions of the grand conspiracy against our Arab nation have been revealed, and that conspiracy is now being carried out by force. There is no doubt that the international community, as repre- sented in this Hall, agrees with us that these conditions, created by Israel and developed and exacerbated by the United States of America, constitute a serious threat to international peace and security. The United States policy of aggression is being systematically applied. That policy holds peoples in contempt and attaches no value to them; this aggravates the situation. The world today has become a jungle in which the law of force prevails. In this con- taminated environment created by Israel and the United States of America, how can we achieve a solution based on international legitimacy as embodied in the Charter of the United Nations and in United Nations resolutions? 2. The policy of President Ronald Reagan-as mani- fested before, during and after his assumption of the presidency of the United States of America-is a well- established, clear and primitive policy, a policy with force as its basic principle and the use or threat of force as its systematic approach to all problems. We in the Middle East knew full well the nature of the Reagan Administra- tion even before it came into office. President Reagan himself, in his statements and his writings, has revealed that he is determined not to place the immense capabilities of the United States ofAmerica in the service of interna- tional peace and co-operation for the solution of crises and problems, but to use force anywhere and in any cir- cumstances where he believes that the interests of United States imperialism are in need of enhancement, promo- tion or expansion. The ReaganAdministration's policies place it in continuous confrontation with peace-loving nations and countries, and especially with the inter~sts of the Movement of Non-Aligned Countries, which are concerned with stability and demand respect for inde- pendence, sovereignty and territorial integrity. This obses- sion with the use of force is seen especially in the Middle East, the most sensitive region in the world and the one which poses the greatest threat to international peace and security. Thursday, 8 December 1983, at 3.35 p.m. NEW YORK 3. The United States-Israeli alliance-intended to impose hegemony and to create a sphere of exclusive influence for the two partners, at the expense of Arab national interests-is nothing new. Since the end of the Second World War, the policy of the United States has' always been characterized by aggressive actions and plans against the Arab nation. But a dangerous escalation has started with the Reagan Administration, which believes in force as a way of imposing its will. It even believes in force as an end in itself. While still a Presidential candidate, Reagan expressed his concerns about the Middle East in terms of which the meaning was clear to any political analyst: the use of all available means to seize the Middle East, to exercise hegemony over it, to expropriate its energy resources, and to hold full sway over the destiny and resources of the region. Before he even took office, President Reagan had elevated Israel from the status of puppet ally to that of equal ally. In August 1979, com- menting on the fall of the Shah, Reagan wrote: "Israel's strength derives from the reality that her affinity with the West is not dependent on the survival of an autocratic or capricious ruler. Israel has the democratic will, national cohesion!. technological capacity and military fibre to stand forth as America's trusted ally."* 4. The Reagan Administration has continuously resorted to deception to divert the attention of the Arabs from the fact of the organic relationship between Washington and Tel Aviv. The suspension of the delivery of F-15 and F-16 aircraft and its subsequent resumption and the freeze and subsequent thaw in the strategic alliance were nothing but an attempt at calming Arab wrath at Israeli actions which went beyond anything ever faced by a United States Administration. But Arab analysts understood this tactic of the United States and were never tricked into believing that the United States could really be serious in its claims of breaking its ties with Israel, for those ties have their original basis in a denial of Arab rights and in the deter- mination to force the Arabs to accept a status of depend- ence ~pon Israel and the United States. 5. The invasion of Lebanon revealed the true face of the Reagan Administration. Not only did Israel invade Lebanon in pursuit of its aggressive interests; it did so with the foreknowledge and encouragement of the United States in order to create new conditions-conditions of aggression-that would make it possible for Israel to annex the West Bank, the Gaza Strip and the Golan Heights in addition to southern Lebanon, thus making part of Israel's historical dreams come true. 6. In addition, the aim was to make Lebanon dependent on Israel, to isolate Lebanon completely from the Arab homeland and to force it to pay the price of a war waged not by Lebanon but by Israel: on tendentious and fabri- cated pretexts. On the other hand, this brutal war served the interests of the United States. The United States presence in Leba"'lon is part of its scheme to establish new bases for its rapid deployment force and to support ·Quoted in English by the speaker. p~ed Jerusalem to announce total acceptance of or to offer complete acquiescence in Israel's military, economic and financial demands. We read the following in an article by Bernard Owertzman, in The New York Times Magazine of 27 November 1983, in which he quotes Eagleburger: "The President and everyone in the Administration wants to sit down with you"-meaning Israel-"and really talk about strategic co-operation in the future- in Lebanon, in the Middle East generally, and every- where. We want to act on it in the context ofPresiden- tial desires and decisions. We like Israel and want to establish the closest relationship. You and we have a long~standing special relationship. This is the time for defining it."* At that time, Reagan's Secretary of State, Mr. Shultz, was occupied in studying a working paper submitted by his assistant, Peter Rodman, calling upon the United States to utilize Israel fully in the Middle East equation. John M. Ooshko commented in The Washtington Post on 22 November 1983 on the strategic co-operation accord expected with Israel: "Agreement would cement Israel's confidence in the United States support on which its security ultimately depends, while it would help the United States extricate itself from Lebanon and go on to pursue other Amer- ican interests in the region."* Those quotations speak for themselves. 12. The worst thing is that the United States pursues an imperialist foreign policy which also reflects the inter- nal contradictions in the United States of America. This has resulted in the blurring of the demarcation line between . internal policy-and naturally by that I mean the war raging between different lobbies and interests-and the foreign policy of the United States. In view of the enor- mous influence of the Zionist lobby, American foreign policy is based on the achievement of the interests of that lobby. If we take into account the policy of violence stem- ming from the American imperialist instinct for violence translated most appropriately by the Reagan Administra- tion to the international arena, and if we take into account the obsession with obtaining the votes of the influential lobbies, headed by the Zionist lobby, we find that what has happened in the Middle East region results from the fact that the Zionist lobby has hijacked power in Washington. Hence, the United States of America cannot commit itself to international law and the provisions of the Charter of the United Nations, since these interests, which are at times conflicting and at times in agreement, are unable to acknowledge the interest ofthe international community in a just peace. 13. Bernard Gwertzman said, in the article which I have mentioned, something that affirms that internal require- ments, foremost among which are selfish electoral inter- ests, govern America and its foreign policy, and not its international commitments under the Charter and under international law. He wrote: th~t.the problems of that region are nearer to solution." [See A/38/458, para. 39.] 36. The reasons for this situation are perfectly obvious. They are, as it were, visible to the naked eye. The malig- nant tumour of Israeli expansionism, which for many years has eate.n away at the Middle East, has once again brought the region to the brink of an extremely dangerous military confrontation, with unforeseeable consequences for international peace and security. The frontiers of Israeli expansion are advancing ever deeper into Arab united States claims to be acting as an honest broker in the Middle East were able to see for themselves the lengths to which Washington is prepared to go to accommo- date the aggressive, expansionist ambitions of its Israeli protege. 46. The fruits of this sinister United States-Israeli alli- ance are clearly apparent not only in the Middle East but also within the United Nations. In the less than three years that it has been in power, the present United States Administration has seven times used its veto to block the sinc~ its creation is based on an entrenched policy of militarist expansion, designed to impose the Israeli point of view by brute force, regardless of the rights of others and against the principles of international law. 55. It is a fact that for Israel condemnation by the inter- national community of its wrongdoings is nl) longer of any great importance; in fact, it never was, since Israel's very creation was an act of injustice against the Palestin- ian people, which is today reduced to the ~tate of wan- derers. After all, yet another territorial conquest is well worth a condemnation. As long as Israel keeps the terri- tories concerned, being condemned by the United Nations does not count for much, despite the protests of those who wish to show us how irritated, or even shocked, they are by the' views of those to whom some refer as the "vocal majority". Even worse, even the condemnation of the aggressor no longer seems to be tolerated by some, and this is a regrettable development for world peace and security. .56. The situation in the Middle East today is more threatening than ever. The polarization of the conflict, the consequences of which must be feared, has contrib- uted to the steady deterioration of the situation. While thus far the conflict has been between the parties we all know, with material assistance from Powers from outside the region,.we must now recognize that the situation is undergoing new and very serious developments which are full of pretext. The massive foreign presence in the region and off the Lebanese coast is increasing so great a tension that a major conflict in the Middle East is not impossible. t.ise~ as a tool for imuosing this alien State and its backers oil our region. This feeling of frustration to which I have referred is the inevitable result of the refusal of the Arab world to accept the distorted values which the aggressor, Israel, uses against the victim, the Palestinian people. That is the basis of the tragedy in the Middle East. My delegation believes that so long as these distorted values persist, there can be no hope whatever of restoring peace .and security to our region. What we have got to say about each other we can stIll say. 167. To conclude, indeed, on this eve of the thirty-fifth anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, it is an utter disgrace to the Organization that foul and obscene language of the kind that we have heard here, be it from the representative of the Islamic Republic of Iran or from the representative of the Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriya, should have been permitted without any obstruction. 168. The PRESIDENT (interpretation from Spanish): I call on the representative of the Libyan Arab Jama- hiriya, who wish~s to exerc!se his right C?f r~p!y a seco.nd time. I remind hIm that thIS statement IS lImIted to fIve minutes. 169. Mr. TREIKI (Libyan Arab Jamahiriya) (interpre- tation from Arabic): We have just heard a statement which constitutes another insult to the Organization. The United Nations considers zionism to be a racist movement and a form of racism, while the representative of the Zionist entity considers it to be a liberation movement. That shows his respect for the United Nations and its resolutions. 170. The attempt made by the representative of the Zionist entity to distract us from the main question under discussion-the question of the Zionist entity's aggression in the Middle East, its occupation of Lebanon and its annexation of the Golan Heights and Jerusalem-cannot make us forget that the artificial racist entity is an expan- sionist entity and that what we should be considering is the fundamental question of the Middle East. 171. They try to justify their position on the grounds that the Nazis killed Jews. Well, of course the Nazis killed Jews, and we condemn nazism. But the Nazis also killed about 20 million Russians and 10 million Czechoslovaks and Poles. Why do we not talk about that? Were they 173. This artificial entity, which represents fascism and nazism, must be called to order; it should not be here among us; it should be with its friend and ally, South Africa. But we must prevent it from continuing to expand and to commit the crimes of which it is guilty. This weapon of accusations about anti-Semitism, with which they silence free voices in Europe and America, cannot silence us. We are not anti-Semites, as I have said; we are anti-Zionists and we will continue to be anti Zionists. That is why we wished to reply to that man who has just spoken-but in fact we should not even call him a ~an because his morality does not warrant that charactenza- tion. I should like to conclude, and not waste precious time. I will not reply to the representative of the Nazi, racist entity ev,~n if he speaks again.

As representatives will recall, at its 40th and 65th plenary meetings, the Assembly elected 17 members of the Eco- nomic and Social Council for a three-year term beginning on 1 January 1984. 175. Because the third unrestricted ballot taken at the 65th plenary meeting was inconclusive, we must, in accordance with rule 94 of the rules of procedure, proceed to a first restricted ballot in the third series of restricted ballots. Since one seat remains to be filled from the Group of Latin American States, we shall proceed to a ballot restricted to the two States that obtained the largest number of votes in the last ballot, namely, Haiti and Nicaragua. This is in accordance with rule 94. 176. Ballot papers will now be distributed. I would request members to write the name of only one State. Ballot papers containing the name of a State other than Haiti or Nicaragua and those containing more than one name will be declared invalid. At the invitation of the President, Mrs. Pinto de Casap (Bolivia), U Ko (Burma), Mr. F6ldedk (Hungary), Mr. Barrios (Spain) and Mr. Kitikiti (Zimbabwe) acted as tellers.

The meeting will be suspended while the ballots are being counted.

The result of the voting is as follows: Number of ballot papers: 147 Number of invalid ballots: 1 Number of valid ballots: 146 Abstentions: 6 Number of members voting: 140 Nic.a~agua 72 HaIti " 60 182. The PRESIDENT (interpretation/rom Spanish): As neither of the States has obtained the required two- thirds majority, the General Assembly will continue the voting and will hold a third restricted ballot. As in the last ballot, the only States whose names may be included in the ballot papers are Haiti and Nicaragua. Any paper containing the names of other States or of more than one State will be declared invalid. At the invitation of the President, Mrs. Pinto de Casap (Bolivia), U Ko (Burma), Mr. F6ldedk (Hungary), Mr. Barrios (Spain) and Mr. Kitikiti (Zimbabwe) acted as tellers. A vote was taken by secret ballot. 183. The PRESIDENT (interpretation/rom Spanish): I propose to suspend the meeting while the ballots are being counted. The meeting was suspended at 7.20 p.m. and resumed at 7.25 p.m. 184. The PRESIDENT (interpretation/rom Spanish): The result of the voting is as follows: Number 0/ ballot papers: 140 Number of invalid ballots: 0 Number of valid ballots: 140 Abstentions: 6 Number of members voting: 134 Required majority: 90 Number 0/ votes obtained: Nic.a~agua 76 HaItI 58 Number 0/ ballot papers: 136 Number 0/ invalid ballots: 0 Number 0/ valid ballots: 136 Abstentions: 4 Number 0/ members voting: 132 Required majority: 88 Number 0/ votes obtained: Nic.a~agua 73 HaItI 54 Bolivia 4 Grenada 1 190. The PRESIDENT (interpretation/rom Spanish): Since no candidate has received the necessary majority and in view of the late hour, I believe, after consultation with the delegations concerned, that it would be appro- priate not to continue the balloting today, but to postpone it until a later date in the hope that an understanding may be reached between the States concerned. .The meeting rose at 7.55 p.m. NOTES