S/PV.1721 Security Council

I should like to inforin members of the Council that, as President of the Council, I have received a letter from Ambassador Ghorra, the Permanent Representative of Lebanon to the United Nations, requesting that the Lebanese delegation be invited to take part, without the right to vote, in the consideration of the agenda item before the Security Council today. In accordance with established practice and the provisional rules of procedure of the Security Council, I propose to invite the representative of Lebanon to take the place reserved for him in the Council chamber and to take part, without the right to vote, in the Security Council’s examination of the situation in the Middle East, He will be invited to take a place at the Council table when it is his turn to speak. Present: The representatives of the following States: Australia, Austria, China, France, Guinea, India, Indonesia, Kenya, Panama, Peru, Sudan, Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, United States of America and Yugoslavia. Provisional agenda (S/Agenda/l721) 1. Adoption of the agenda. 2. The situation in the Middle East: (a) Security Council resolution 33 1 (1973); (b) Report of the Secretary-General under Security Council resolution 33 1 (1973) (S/10929). At the invitation of the President, Mr. E. Ghorra (Lebanon) took the place reserved for him at the side of the Council chamber. me meeting was called to order at 4 p.m.

Mr. President, it is my turn now to convey to you the message of Africa. Together with my colleagues from Algeria, Chad, Guinea, Kenya, Nigeria and the United Republic of Tanzania, we bring you a message from the elders of our continent. Our 41 Heads of State and Government have dispatched us to say this to you: Please move to bury the bloody hatchet and restore justice to a region that has since the beginning of time been the hub of the world. Whatever happens there touches almost everywhere. That is one reason. But if Africa is concerned with what is happening in that region, it has other reasons also to be so. Adoption of the agenda The agenda was adopted. The situation in the Middle East: (u) Security Council resolution 331 (1973); (b) Report of the Secretary-General under Security Council resolution 331 (1973) (S/10929) 1, The PRESIDENT (translation from Russian): In accordance with decisions adopted by the Security Council at previous meetings, I intend, with the Council’s consent, to invite the representatives of Egypt, Israel, Jordan, the United Republic of Tanzania, Chad, the Syrian Arab Republic, Nigeria, Algeria, Morocco, the United Arab Emirates, Somalia, Guyana, Mauritania, Kuwait, Qatar and Saudi Arabia to take part, without the right to vote, in the Council’s examination of the situation in the Middle East. 4. Africa is concerned because it cannot stand idly by watching part of the territory of one of the founding member States of its continental organization occupied by a foreign army, Africa is concerned because an injustice has been inflicted on the peoples of that area, in the sense that “one nation has solemnly promised to a second nation the country of a third”, to use the words of Arthur Koestler. At the invitation of the President, Mr. M. H El-Zayyat (Egypt), Mr. Y. Tekoah (Israel), and Mr, A.H. Sharaf (Jordan] took places at the Council table; and Mr. S. A. Salim (United Republic of Tanzania), Mr. I2 G. Ouangmotthing [Chad), Mr. H. Kelani (Syrian Arab Republicj, Mr. E. 0. Ogbu (Nigeria), Mr. A. Bouteflika (Algeria), Mr. 11X Zen&r (Morocco), Mr. A. Al-Pachachi (United Arab Emirates), Mr. H. Nur Elmi (Somalia), Mr. R. E. Jackson (Guyana), Mr. M. El Hassen (Mauritania), Mr. A. K. Bishara (Kuwait), Mr. J. Y. Jamal (Qatar), and Mr. 0. Sakkaf (Saudi Arabia) took the places reserved for them at the side of the Cbuncil chamber. 5. Africa is concerned because if it condones might as a source of right, the grounds for resisting the anachronistic barbarism of Portugal, South Africa and the white minority in Zimbabwe will be eroded. The liberation rnovcments in our continent ebb and flow with the success and failure of others engaged in the same pursuit. The Palestinian people’s fight for regaining its land is an organic whole with that of Guinea (Bissau), with that of Angola, with that of Mozambique, with that of South Africa and with that of Zimbabwe. 7. Africa is concerned because its media are now resounding with disconcerting tidings presaging an impending confrontation of which large parts of its land and people will not be able to writhe free, even if they wanted to do so. 8. Africa is concerned because Africa believes in the United Nations and owes the United Nations a good deal. Some of us, as well as others, owe their very existence to it. And because of this faith, Africa has waited for six years to see this Organization put an end to this tragedy. And if it moves now, it is moving because it can no longer sit and watch one single member of the world forum rocking the boat and eventually sinking it. 9. That is the essence of the message we bring you from an organization that represents almost one third of the membership of the United Nations and some 300 million people. And in all humility may I say that when Africa speaks the world would do well to heed-not because Africa is armed with steel but because its sense of justice is instinctive. The last time the world did not heed the warnings of Africa it brought disaster on itself. That was the time when the Emperor of Ethiopia pleaded with the League of Nations to restrain the Fascists from gassing his people and raping his land. My friend Mr. El-Zayyat has ably and amply quoted [I71 7th meeting/ from His Majesty’s speech. What he did not say is that the big and mighty ignored the Emperor’s plea, and three years later the Second World War broke out in the name of freedom and justice. 10. Today Africa comes again, not in the person of a lone figure but in a massive train of emissaries. And believe you me the mere thought that the United Nations is likely to go the way of the League of Nations makes us shudder. We do not want it to cross our minds, but we shall be hiding the truth if we do not say that it does cross our minds. How interesting that the same thought has also crossed the mind of no less a person than Mrs. Golda Meir, Prime Minister of Israel. Addressing the United Nations General Assembly on the occasion of the commemorative session, Mrs. Meir said: “The First World War was the war to have ended all wars. Those of us who were in our teens then believed this. The entire world wanted it to be true; the League of Nations was to be the guarantee that this would be so. And we were all witnesses to, and victims of, its failure. “The reason for the failure, I am convinced, was not lack of a sincere desire for peace but lack of determination to act for its preservation. We need only recall the moving words of the Emperor of Ethiopia, when he appeared before this Organization in 1962, warning against a recurrence of the international inaction which had opened the way to aggression against his country and thus endangered the peace of the world. It is in the light of the League’s tragic failure that we must judge the 11. Are our minds really at one, or do words mean different things to different people? The world has every right to ask us why we are coming in at this juncture. What is new? Why are we coming as forcefully as never before? The answer is very simple: the world should not forget that we have not let this crisis out of our sight ever since it was inflicted on the world. Africa did not come to this path on an impulse. Ever since the war in 1967, it has been treading slowly, calling on the world community here to seek a way around the obduracy of those who are making it impossible for differences to be composed. 12. The records of our summit and mb!isterial meetings bear witness to that. We are coming in at this moment because in many ways the political climate that prevailed in November 1971 seems to obtain now. There is now, as then, a disquieting lull. There is now, as then, a dangerous tendency in this Council to trap the worId in the slippery vocabulary that allows for outrageous shifting of positions, and evasiveness. There is now, as then, the portentous sound of sabre rattling. And it is for all those reasons that our Heads of State and Government have asked us to come here and convey to you the pulse of their meeting by putting to you some of the thoughts that were expressed. In doing so we want, as my friend John Malecela said the other day (1718th meeting], to render our support to you in any constructive course you may take to restore peace in the Middle East and keep the faith of Africa in the United Nations as firm as we would like to see it. 13. Let us, therefore, look briefly at the scene as it is, the scene we hope to change. In spite of the 310 resolutions adopted by the principal organs of the United Nations on the Palestinian problem since 1948, Israel wants to think that the United Nations jurisprudence on the matter only rests on Security Council resolution 242 (1967). Let US grant that it does so, for the sake of argument. Where then has this resolution taken us since November 1967? 14. The meetings of the big Powers, initiated by France in April 1969, came to a standstill in December of the same year because the United States of America found itself unable to continue talking with the other permanent members of this Council. Secretary of State Rogers’ initiative of June 1970 came to nothing. So did President Sadat’s offer of February 1971. 15. Ambassador Gunnar Jarring moved in with an innovative formula on 8 February 197 1. His initiative was not the figment of the imagination of a lone man, as some would wish to suggest in construing the Jarring aide-r&moire as an unwarranted attempt to construe a carefully composed resolution. His was an imaginative endeavour of an honourable peace-maker, which is in accord with the views of the I See Ofjicial Records of the General Assembly, Twenty-fifth Session, Plenary Meetings, 1876th meeting, paras. 74-75. “They reaffirmed their support for Security Council resolution 242 (1967) and the efforts of the Special Representative and expressed the view that the parties should co-operate with and respond positively to him.” “The mission came to the conclusion that the success of renewed negotiations could be regarded as assured, if the practical application of the concept of secured and recognized boundaries did not oblige Egypt to alienate part of its national territory and that it was necessary to obtain Israel’s agreement to the putting into effect (without territorial annexation) of arrangements offering sufficient guarantees to ensure its security.” [Ibid., para. 96.1 16. Furthermore, the working group of deputies, on 3 March 1971, issued a draft communique which was presented and approved by the permanent representatives on 5 March of that year. That communique said: “They reaffirmed their support for Security Council resolution 242 (1967) and the efforts of the Special Representative under this resolution and expressed the view that the parties should co-operate with and respond positively to him. They welcomed the initiative undertaken by the Special Representative on 8 February concerning key issues of the settlement and expressed the view that, in taking this initiative, Ambassador Jarring was acting fully in accordance with the terms of his mandate under Security Council resolution 242 (1967).” 21. And here comes my point of fair minds thinking alike. Article V of the Armistice Agreement with Egypt, concluded on 24 February 1949, provides that: “The Armistice Demarcation line is not to be construed in any sense as a political or territorial boundary . . .“z, The same goes for the other three neighbouring Arab States. The Armistice Agreement, concluded with them in the same year, provided that the armistice lines are delineated without prejudice to the ultimate settlement of the Palestinian question. And there is the rub: the settlement of the Palestinian question. We are the best qualified to know why. The United Nations has chosen to call the annually recurring Arab-Israeli problems “the Palestinian question.” We cannot come today and deny the existence of a Palestinian people and a Palestinian nation. Exercises in self-righteousness cannot deny it, and equivocation might lead those who are less versed in the problem to indulge themselves in self-delusion. But those who know have no right to do so, unless we want our efforts to expire in disaster. 17. Ever since December 1967, when Ambassador Jarring met with the parties, the Israeli party has been struck with the idea of direct negotiations. When they came around to the idea of indirect negotiations, in 1970, they stipulated that the indirect talks were only the first stage. The dogged insistence on an id& jJxe gives one the feeling that it is not a peace agreement that is being sought, but rubbing the nose of the vanquished, primarily that of Egypt. IS this what the Security Council wants? Is this what the other protagonists of direct or indirect negotiations want? Was Lieutenant General Burns, the former Chief of Staff of the United Nations Truce Supervision Organisation, that far from the truth when, some five years before the June war, he summed up the Israelis’ intentions thus: “They proclaim daily that they want peace, a peaceful settlement as soon as possible, that they are willing to sit down and negotiate with the Arabs any time, any place. But, of course, what they want is peace on their own terms.” 22. The kind of logic advanced by our 10 wise men irritates the leaders of Israel. They would like to think that the Middle Eastern crisis is a consequence of the June 1967 war. The truth of the matter is that the June war is a consequence of the unresolved crisis since Israel burgeoned its way into a State in 1947. Any reference to the Armistice Agreement vexes Israel, because going back 25 years helps clear our thinking, though it does not necessarily mean that we are unaware of the facts created by war and current international diplomacy. The present cannot be divorced from the past. It is one piece with it. It is the prelude to the future. Those who have an almost psychopathic sense of history and heritage should be the first to realize this. On the other question of territorial integrity of States Members of this Organization, Israel is neither in tune with our Committee of Ten, nor, indeed, is it in tune with the verdict of this Organization. 18. In March 1971, Secretary-General U Thant reported to this Council that it was a “matter for increasing concern” that Ambassador Jarring’s attempt to break the deadlock had not so far been successful. “I appeal, therefore, to the Government of Israel”, the Secretary-General continued, “to give further consideration to this question and respond favourably to Ambassador Jarring’s initiative.” [S/lOO70/Add.2, para. Li.] 19. In reply to this appeal, there was only silence. Africa decided to break that silence, It had to move, and so it did, only eight months after this significant statement. The Committee of Ten African Heads of State was formed. There was no other way. The world had gone astray. 2 i?fflciaI Records of the Security Council, Fourth Year, Special Supplement No. 3. “The border changes Israel seeks do not involve loss of territory vital to Arab interests. The Sinai desert has in the past served no Egyptian purpose save to provide a ready staging-ground for attacks on Israel and for the maintenance of blockade. No Egyptians live in Sinai and only a few Bedouin tribes (not Egyptian citizens) roam its sands. Sharm-el-Sheikh, a desolate, uninhabited outpost, was used by the Egyptians only to blockade the Gulf of Aqaba. In any case, Israel, under a peace settlement, would not seek to retain all ‘or most of Sinai. As for the Golan Heights, it constituted primarily a military fortress directed at our agricultural settlements in the valley below. I have made it clear several times that in negotiations with the Kingdom of Jordan we will naturally present proposals for a territorial agreement.” 24. ‘This condescending attitude takes a sharp turn into one’s vanity and you read on as if you were reading somebody who conquered the world, not one who had only won a battle against a few Arab countries. What else? The Prime Minister of Israel goes on in the same article to assert that “Jerusalem shall remain united and the capital of Israel”. The Secretary-General’s report enumerates the number of resolutions adopted since 4 July 1967 in 12 paragraphs that show how resolute world opinion is on the question of Jerusalem. 25. It really takes a very sick mind to think that we are anti-Semite or anti-Jewish in Africa, but the way Israel has been conducting itself over the years prompts us to say what Henry Byroade said to Israel as early as 1954: “You should drop the attitude of the conqueror and the conviction that a policy of retaliatory killings is the only policy that your neighbours will understand. YOU should make your deeds correspond to your frequent utterances of the desire for peace.” 26. The message we bring you from Africa is not different from this advice to Israel given by one of the eminent intellects of the day,. The advice has been ignored and our own efforts have come to nothing. Our leaders have therefore come to the same conclusion John Davies came to 15 years after that wise advice. Like him, African leaders now believe that, “. . . in the end one must ever be prepared to impose corrective measures on Israel against her will”. Several of our leaders were in public life when Count Bernadotte referred to what he called “Israel’s arrogance” and “its blatant unwillingness for co-operation”, and what he stressed as the “uncompromising and stiff-necked behaviour of the Jewish government”. Experiences like this are usually dismissed as pro-Arab sentiments, but that is only flying in the face of facts. Count Bernadotte has been more than vindicated 20 years later. One has only to skim through the section on the “Palestine refugee problem”, in the report of the Secretary-General before us, and visualize 27. The heart of the matter is that Israel has long ago decided that: “a complete solution of the refugee problem will come about only when the Arab States assume their full responsibility within the vast geography that is at their disposal”, and this is the voice of no less a personage than the Prime Minister of Israel, only three months ago. This is the way uf the conqueror, ii is not that way of one who is seeking peace. 28. So what does Africa hope for? What is to be done now? We do not pretend we have a monopoly of wisdom but I, for one, feel that our leaders would first and foremost like to see Ambassador Jarring resume his mission. Ambassador Jarring’s trials have been many, and if a hero emerges from the Secretary-General’s report before US, it is Gunnar Jarring. I am not referring to his physical trials. shuttling between here, Moscow, Cairo, Tel Aviv, Cyprus and West Africa. It is the moral fortitude with which he put up with the manner of Israel in handling his mission and at one stage his own person. 29. On the question of withdrawal, for instance: “They reiterated their public statements that they did tool consider themselves bound by General Assembly resolution 2799 (XXVI).” (Ibid., para. 102.1 They made it plain “ . . . that before discussions could take place U&X Ambassador Jarring’s auspices, he should give an assur. ante that he considered his mandate to be based solely 01% Security Council resolution 242 (1967) and that he dill not consider himself bound by General Assembly resulution 2799 (XXVI) or by his aide-mhmoire of 8 Februarfa 1971”. [Ibid.] It is not a man of intellect, resourcefulness and courage of conviction that is wanted, it is a postman. Ambassador Jarring did not intrude when he conceived of his aidem&moire. He was probing for a way out of the rut. tic meant to end four years of futile hedging. We believe that he did a great deal, and any attempt to cramp his style would be a pity. The task is not that of a messenger: it needs inventiveness, it needs ingenuity, and it needs energy. He has all these qualities and we recommend that he start again forthwith. 30. But where should he go from here? The African stance is obvious from the little you have seen. It stands 111 “Even more important than Israel’s dependency upon US is the fact that we ourselves have a crucial stake in the Middle East-the avoidance of conflict with the Soviet Union. It takes no great feat of imagination to conjure up some new Arab-Israeli crisis in which the two sides managed to draw their respective patrons into a head-on conflict. Premier Meir says that we ought not to press for Israeli withdrawal from the conquered Arab territories because, as she puts it, ‘This is not the border of the United States . . .‘, If indeed that were the whole of the matter, if Israel, as the Premier says, really were prepared to ‘stand up for itself without involving others, it might make sense to let the Arabs and Israelis work out their differences, or fight them out, and come to their own solution. We all know, however, that that is not the case, that American interests of the most crucial nature are involved, that another war in the Middle East might well set us against the Russians, and that, therefore, we have not only the right, but a positive responsibility, to bring an influence to bear.” 31. The Security Council is up against a formidable task, and it will have to face up to it. How much help the Secretary-General and Ambassador Jarring will be getting from the great Powers remains to be seen. Judging by the past attitudes of successive Governments of the United States of America, one cannot help feeling that there will not be much help forthcoming in the future unless a complete change of heart takes place in the thinking of public opinion in America. But that is a matter for the citizens of the United States to decide. As for us, we can only say that it is about time the United States of America came out clearly on this issue for its own sake, for the sake of world peace and for the sake of Africans and Arabs who hope to see the United States unbound. Its responsibility is not a mean one. Many great Powers have committed grave sins on their own volition and for their own interests. In so doing they were first-rate sinners and their history abounds with not so spotless deeds, but, on reflection, those spots do not blemish, otherwise, a record as good as man can afford to be. But I know of no example in history where a great Power chose of its own volition, and perhaps against its own interests, to be a fellow traveller in sin. America would do justice to itself by crediting, on this issue, Israel with everything and the Arabs, and indeed the whole world, with nothing. 33. I will now go on with what we think should come out of this debate. Having reactivated Ambassador Jarring’s mission and secured the total withdrawal of occupying forces, a different atmosphere will be created and new ideas bound to come up. They are not going to come up through the sterile argumentation over direct, indirect, and proximity talks. What is required is a restoration of confidence. Mankind may be brutish, may be egotistic, but it will never stop getting more intelligent, more enlightened. The African message, therefore, is first things first. 34. We have heard my colleague from Nigeria on the resolution adopted in Addis Ababa before our coming, but, by way of summing up what I was saying about Africa’s wish to reactivate Ambassador Jarring’s mission, I should like you to bear with me if I read out what I consider most relevant to the question I posed a little while ago, that is, “Where do we go from here? ” An OAU resolution adopted at Addis Ababa contains the following paragraphs: paragraph 3 deplores Israel’s negative and obstructive attitude which prevents the resumption of the Jarring mission; paragraph 4 invites Israel publicly to declare its adherence to the principle of non-annexation of territories through the use of force; paragraph 5 invites Israel to withdraw immediately from all the occupied Arab territories to pre-5 June 1967 lines in accordance with Security Council resolution 242 (1967) of 22 November 1967. 32. The voice of reason has come, a few years ago, from that tower of intellect and almost liturgical character in Washington: Senator William Fulbright. Addressing the Annual Political Union at Yale, in April 1971, the Senator had this to say on the Middle East in the course of his illuminating lecture entitled “New Internationalism”: “For reasons which may warrant our sympathy, but not our support, Israel pursues a policy of antiquated-and to a great degree delusional-self-reliance. As Foreign Minister Eban expressed it, ‘a nation must be capable of tenacious solitude’. In fact, neither Israel nor any other nation is capable of so profound an isolationism in our time. Israel is heavily dependent on the United States for both arms and economic assistance. Only last December Congress appropriated a half billion dollars for military assistance to Israel. Since 1948 the United States Government has provided $1.4 billion in direct economic assistance to Israel; this does not include military aid. Since 1948 private American citizens have provided another $3 billion in tax-deductible contributions and regularly purchase between $300 and $400 million a year in Israeli bonds. Included in the massive American military aid, which has increased greatly since the 1967 35. Before I conclude, I should like to address myself to a significant view in the chapter entitled “Observations” in the Secretary-General’s report. It is significant because it concerns preserving the United Nations itself. The Secretary-General refers to the efforts of the Organization and goes on to warn that “these efforts can only be useful if the parties concerned wish to avail themselves of them”. [S/l 0929, para. 117.1 “ . 4 . it is important to understand that even those Arab States at loggerheads with each other on political matters or international issues are united in a purpose of hostility to Israel”. That is true, but what is uniting the Arabs, the Africans, and indeed, the whole world, is not hostility to Israel as much as a desire to see an honourable and just peace reigning in the Middle East. The Israeli leaders have to help the world by being a little consistent. 37. The 25 years that have passed since the State of lsraei was founded have been years of real agony for that State and for the Arabs, and no amount of talking can obscure the fact. Israel has won a war, but has not won the peace; it is not likely to do so as long as it lives in a world of make-believe. This will not amuse Israel and its unquestioning world. The Prime Minister of Israel holds that: “ . . . there can be no greater mistake in assessing the current situation in the Middle East than to assume that the conflict continues because of specific political Arab grievances”. She goes on to enumerate the grievances that she says Jo not constitute a problem: “ . . . the plight of the Arab refugees, the Israeli prcscnce on the West Bank, or in the Sinai, the reunification of Jerusalem”. To her, those are not the causes of the conflict. “The root of the issue”, she contends, “is the Arab attitude to Israel’s very existence and security. Once the Arab countries accept the legitimacy of Israel as WC have always accepted theirs . . .“. Well, if this is not make-believe, what is it then? If there Is one single root of the problem it is this make-bclicve. l-low to counter this, I do not know. Can it be countered‘? One doubts it. Hence our contention and decision that Africa may have to reformulate its attitude towards Israel if that country continues with its policies. 38. One hopes that Israel will understand that it is only after a scrutiny of truth that peace can be built-truth that all believers in this Organization should uphold absolutely. It is the truth of live and let live. In the voice of one of the illustrious builders of the United Nations, Mr, Dag l-lammarskjold: “For others to live with others, you have to see how those others think and how they feel. Nohdy CM he Bubcr, in his h/h’ it, ~,ffOpiU, that: “Power abdicates ,,Q under the stress of coun1cr-power.” 40. SO hCrC WC UT -Wt ilSkhg for the moon, but asking YOU t0 do Wtllit iS Withill thC CO~~lpass of your authority, Again in the WOr’dS lbf Senator t~ulbright, the Middle ~~~~ problem provides you “with the best opl>ortimity since World War 11 tc In&e U.S.? of the pcacc-keeping prL)ccdures of the United Nations in approsirnntoly the manner envisioned by tllc framers and, in SO dOiQ!, tr) CrC:ltc ;L Vidldk precedent for the future”. 41. In summing up the hlitldlu Hast situation in his address at the tenth session of the Assembly of African l-leads of State and Govcrnmcnt, the Sccrctary-General, Kurt Wald. heim, had this to Sil): “The intractable nature of the problem may be largely due tu the fact that fllfldkl~11C~ltill principles of the Charter are involved: the sanctity of the territorial integrity of Mcmbcr States; the right of cvcry State to bc secure within its territorial boundaries; and the inalienable riglit of self-detemlinatiun of pc0plcs. Tlicsc principles are of crucial i~~lportililCC in the f0t7~~l~lilti~~n of any peace agreement. I..ct me un~phsize tllilt WC arc dealing with a highly csplosivc situation. Time is not in our favour. The elements of this iluesthm show that the longer the issue remains unsolved the more complicated they become. The new efforts to find ;I way to a settlement in the Middle East need not IX futile. Thar effort should include il new appraisal r,f the possibilities illld procedures of the Security (‘ouncil itself for conciliation iltld 3n exploration of a11 the mc’ans by wllicll lhc framework of the United Nations might he usctl tn assist the partics in reaching a just iUld lasting scttlc~~~cllt.‘” 42. llvw true, then, it is Ihal what is on trial is not Israel, What is really on trial is the Security Council itself. It was thercfijrc rcfrcshing the 0th d:w -to Kild the statement made by Ambassador John Scali,*thc United States reljre. sentative to the Ilnited Nati\>ns, at the annual United Nations-United States tlinnur, and his rcfereim to Our effort within the Security (‘ouncil as “a testimony of mankind’s continuing hop tllilt this gKilt imna~iO~lal Orga~liziltion cull I&Y towards its most important goa’ ns the guarantor of pence”. WC hope those words will be matched by deeds. 43. Mr. President, thank you for calling upon me to speak. Thank you for listening patiently. Your holding cf t”e 51. Two, is the principle of territorial integrity that everyone here upholds and defends-inchrding the United States of America, whose last five Presidents have asserted their conviction that this principle should be inviolable in the Middle East-applicable to all the nations or to all the nations except the Arab nations? 52. Three, is the principle of self-determination acclaimed by all the United Nations Members, including Israel, valid vis-a-vis the hundreds of thousands, the millions, of Arab Palestinians, or is it valid for everyone except for the Palestinians?

The next speaker on the list is the Minister for Foreign Affairs of Egypt, on whom I now call.

Pending the full study we have said we are making of the Secretary-General’s report, we have now three queries that I hope the Secretary- General will be able to answer. They are all about the aide-memoire of February 1971 presented by his Special Representative [S/10403, annex I]. .53. Could the Council have adopted, or could it adopt now, any decisions or resolutions that would ahow or can be interpreted to allow the breach of these three principles? These are also serious questions, but we will patiently wait until the end of this debate to hear the answers to them. The purpose of this short intervention is to solicit, as soon as possible, the answers of the Secretary- General, if he wishes to give them, only to the first three queries about Ambassador Gunnar Jarring’s aide-memoire of February 1971. 46. First, this aide-memoire deals obviously with the Egyptian sector only. Was the Special Representative to follow this aide-memoire with others covering the rest of the subjects contained in Council resolution 242 (1967) of 22 November 1967? More precisely, did the Special Representative intend to have other aide-mbmoires for Jordan, about Palestinian refugees, and for Syria if Syria should express its willingness to receive such an aidem&moire? That is the first question.

The Secretary-General is taking part in the meetings of the Security Council devoted to examination of the situation in the Middle East. He has heard your three questions, and I noticed that he wrote them down. Consequently, there is no need for me to put your questions to him formally. I hope that he will answer these questions. As to your other questions, I assume that they will be studied and that YOU will be given answers in due course. 47. Second, the aide-memoire of 8 February 1971 does not mention the Palestinian territory of Gaza. I, as the then representative of Egypt, noted this omission. I find in my own notes that in answer Ambassador Jarring explained that the absence of a reference to the Gaza Strip, which was entrusted to the administration of Egypt in accordance with the Egyptian-Israeli Armistice Agreement of 1949, was without prejudice to the status of the strip as “an Arab territory occupied by Israel which should be de-occupied”. I hope my notes are correct. 55. I now call on the Secretary-General. ‘56. The SECRETARY-GENERAL: I just wanted to say that I take note of the questions which have been put to me by the Foreign Minister of Egypt. I am sure that the Council will understand that I shah need a little time for a careful study before answering them. For this reason I would wish, with your permission, Mr. President, to answer them at a later meeting. 48. The third query seeks an affirmation from the Secretary-General, if he would, of the fact that the Permanent Representative of the United States of America, in his capacity as the Chairman of the meeting of 24 June 1971 of the four-Power talks, did indeed inform the Secretary-General of the United Nations officially, if orally, that the representatives of the four permanent members of the Security Council welcomed and supported the initiative of the Special Representative in his aide-m&moire of 8 February and believed that he, in taking that initiative, was acting fully in accordance with the terms of his mandate under resolution 242 (1967).

Mr. President, I should like to start by joining with others in congratulating you, and indeed ourselves, on your assumption of the office of President of the Security Council. You have years of experience both on matters of substance and of the procedures of this Council, and indeed of other organs of the United Nations, and this augurs well for the orderly and successful conduct of our affairs this month. 58. I should like also to congratulate the representative of the Sudan on his impeccable handling of our affairs in May, and I am particularly happy to do so in the presence of his 49. Those are all the queries I put today. The Council is conscious, however, that there are three other questions I have put earlier. 60. It is for these reasons that my Government is anxious that the Security Council should make the most of the present opportunity. As the Secretary-General has noted in his admirable report which provides the background for our discussions, this is the first time that the Security Council has considered the Middle East problem as a whole since the adoption of resolution 242 (1967) of 22 November 1967. My Government has always recognized that, in the absence of progress towards the implementation of that resolution, it would be necessary for the Council to address itself to the problem again. We therefore look upon this debate as a responsibility and as a challenge. It is a challenge to us all to find a way to break out of what the Secretary-General, in introducing his report at the 1717th meeting, described as “a vicious circle of action and reaction, violence and reprisal” and to escape from, again I quote the Secretary-General’s words, the “series of seemingly insurmountable obstacles to the process of conciliation and settlement”. My delegation, for its part, faces this debate with determination and hope. 61. I have spoken of the absence of progress. But in fact some advances have been made since the war of June 1967 towards the establishment of a just and lasting peace in the Middle East. These should not be underestimated; and it is important that they should not be undone. First, there is resolution 242 (1967) itself. This resolution constituted the first serious attempt since 1947 by the international community to tackle the roots of the Middle East problem as opposed to palliating the symptoms. It was adopted unanimously and has since received overwhelming support. We must be careful not to jeopardize that support. There are other advances too that must be preserved. In particular, I have in mind the declared willingness of the Government of Egypt to enter into a peace agreement with Israel if that State would give certain commitments covering the implementation on its part of resolution 242 (1967). Jordan too has given an analogous undertaking. These are very considerable advances and it is essential that the Council should, in its consideration of the problem, ensure that this hard-earned ground is retained. 62. But it is not enough to say that we must not throw away the progress already made, that we must preserve 63. I have read the Secretary-General’s report with much interest. It provides a clear, if depressing, account of the efforts which have been made over the past six years to achieve a just and lasting peace on the basis of resolution 242 (1967). Above all, the report is a testimonial to tile efforts which have been pade by the Secretary-General and by his predecessor and in particular by their Special Representative, Mr. Jarring. The patience and ingenuity which Mr. Jarring has shown over the past six years have earned the admiration of us all. It is certainly not his fault that his efforts have so far not met with success. 64. The Secretary-General’s report deals mainly with the efforts that have been made within the framework of the United Nations. As most previous speakers have stressed, the United Nations has a particular responsibility in the Middle East. But, in addition to the efforts made within the United Nations framework, there have been many other efforts. Without attempting to list them all, I should like to say a few words about some of them. First, there have been the efforts of individual countries, notably the United States, to contribute towards a lessening of tension in the area and to increase the chances of a settlement. For its part, my Government has consistently welcomed these efforts. It was largely thanks to United States efforts that the cease-fire was established along the Suez Canal in August 1970. In this connexion, we should all take to hear1 the Secretary-General’s observation in his report that the cease-fire will remain precarious and unstable so lang as a just and accepted settlement of the problem is not in sight. More recently, United States efforts have concentrated an the possibility of negotiating an interim arrangemeld, designed to result in some measure of withdrawal by Israeli armed forces and the consequent reopening of the Suez Canal. The British Government has always made clear that we would be glad to see such an interim arrangement COW? into effect, on one important condition; that is, that it 65. Other efforts that have been made outside the immediate context of the United Nations include the mission of the African Heads of State in 1971. This was an important and helpful initiative by a group of statesmen with an impartial interest in peace and justice; and their balanced conclusions quoted to us by the Foreign Minister of Nigeria at the 1718th meeting and again today by the Foreign Minister of the Sudan, seemed to my delegation to open up a promising approach. There have also been useful bilateral exchanges between the United States and the Soviet Union and consultations between representatives of France, the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom and the United States. These latter consultations, which became known as the four-Power talks, were not formally set up by the United Nations and, therefore, they are not covered in any detail in the Secretary-General’s report. Though the four-Power talks, unfortunately, did not succeed in finding a solution to the Middle East problem, and while the participants themselves recognized that the terms of a settlement could not be dictated from outside, progress was made and valuable work was done, particularly on international guarantees. That is a subject of obvious importance, We for our part have always considered that there is a close interconnexion between all the elements of the settlement envisaged in resolution 242 (1967), and, obviously, if agreement could be reached on a watertight system of guarantees, this would have an important effect on the attitude of the parties towards other elements of the settlement. In any case, guarantees constitute a subject which clearly lends itself to study by third parties, since it is they who would have to provide the guarantees. I would add that, if it appeared that further such consultations between permanent members of the Security Council would be useful, my delegation, for its part, would be ready to take part in them. 67. I thought it right to refer to these examples of efforts made outside the direct United Nations framework. For while, as I have said, it is generally recognized that it would never be possible to impose a solution from outside on the parties to the conflict, or as my Secretary of State has put it, to “dictate a peace”, nevertheless there is very clearly a role for outsiders to play. That is why we welcome any contribution that any countries, large or small, can make, individually or collectively, That, of course, is why we welcome this present renewed effort by the Security Council itself. 68. The story of the Arab-Israel problem is a sad story of missed opportunities. It is quite extraordinary how each time that the establishment of a lasting peace in the area-or at least progress towards it-has appeared to be at hand, something has happened to destroy the opportunity before those concerned can pluck up the courage to seize it. And unfortunately, each time that an opportunity is missed a further obstacle to progress is created, a further complication introduced into the problem. That is why my Government feels so strongly that this present opportunity must not be lost and that every effort must be made to move forward, 69. As I have said, the starting-point-the firm base-for this forward movement is resolution 242 (1967), and it is in our view the duty of this Council to preserve that resolution intact. Now, the mission of the Secretary- General’s Special Representative is part of that resolution, and we feel that it is essential that it too be retainedindeed, not merely retained, but re-energized. We therefore consider that the primary objective of any action taken by this Council should be to provide renewed impetus to the mission of Ambassador Jarring in such a way that it will generate its own momentum. This mission remains, in the view of my Government, the best hope for progress. AS my Secretary of State has put it, “No progress will be made in solving the problem unless the momentum and intensity of the exchange of views is accelerated”. If there is to be any hope of progress the pace of the process must be quickened, the range shortened. 66. It was in the course of the four-Power talks that my delegation first set forth British views on the substance of the problem. Subsequently, thkse views on the essential outlines of a just and lasting settlement, on how the two principles of withdrawal and commitments to peace could be cemented into reality, were set out in a major policy statement which my Foreign Minister, Sir Alec Douglas- Home, made in Harrogate on 31 October 1970 and were repeated by Sir Colin Crowe in the General Assembly on 2November of the same year.3 These views, covering the whole range of issues, including territorial questions and commitments to peace, the problems of the refugees and of freedom of navigation, the question of guarantees and so on-these views hold as good today as they did in the past, and my Government fully stands by them. I have no need to repeat these views at length, But the Foreign Minister of 70. The Secretary-General has noted in his report that the Security Council is the only forum where all the parties to the conflict have been able to meet together in the same room. That is why this debate has given us, the members of this Council, a unique opportunity on which we should surely now build. At least at this stage of the debate, my

I now call on the representative of Israel, to speak in exercise of his right of reply.

I have already drawn the Council’s attention to what appears to us to be the real purpose of the Egyptian demands. The crux of those demands is the following. 73. After 25 years of Egyptian warfare against Israel, Egypt now seeks to impose on Israel Egypt’s diktat to restore the insecurity and vulnerability of the past, to change resolution 242 (1967)-the only basis for United Nations peace-making eFforts accepted by both parties-and to reject negotiations between the parties, the only method that could lead to agreement between them. 74. I regret to say that even as we have been deliberating here in the Council chamber, the Egyptian governmental press has been, day after day, confirming our worst fears regarding the Egyptian position. Thus I indicated here that when demanding Israel’s withdrawal to the 1967 lines, Egypt seems to continue to consider that this will be only the first stage in the struggle against Israel that will go on. In our view, Minister El-Zayyat confirmed that when he declared that Israel’s recognized boundaries were those of 1947. Mr. Hassanin Heykal once more made the Egyptian view more explicit in his weekly article in the semi-official AZ-Ahram of 8 June, in which he wrote: “Israel in its present position, composition and character has no future in the region and is an entity which is historically doomed to extinction. Israel thus constitutes an additional attempt at colonialism, which is out of place.” 75. In my previous interventions I also submitted that Egypt’s refusal to negotiate with Israel is not a matter of procedure, nor is it motivated by Israeli occupation of Egyptian territory, for the refusal predates that occupation, but emanates, it would seem, from Egypt’s denial of Israel’s fundamental, legitimate rights. On 6 June, the very day on which the Security Council opened this debate, Al-Ahram confirmed this and wrote: “The Arab refusal to negotiate with Israel conceals their insistence on the rejection of a racial and colonial entity.” 76. Finally, I drew attention to Egypt’s attempt to change resolution 242 (1967) by proposing the dismemberment of Jordan. AZ-Ahram again confirmed this. Only yesterday it published an article stating that it is essential that the world should recognize a Palestinian State, as proposed in the 77. At the Security Council meeting last Friday, 8 June [I 718th meeting/, I said that the multiplicity of Arab statements in this debate is in fact beneficial. One could almost say today: the more the merrier. No one could demonstrate more convincingly the justice of th.e Israeli position and the extremism of the Arab attitude than the Arab spokesmen themselves. No State Member of the United Nations except Israel is surrounded by enemies who openly proclaim in the United Nations that their objective is to eradicate it, as reaffirmed today with a greater or lesser degree of explicitness by the representatives of Kuwait, Algeria and the Sudan. 78. It is well known that these are not mere words. One does not, for instance, mount a campaign of barbaric slaughter of innocent men, women and children unless one thinks and acts in terms of total annihilation Algeria has served as the haven of Arab terrorists and air pirates. 79. According to press reports the Sudan, apparently out of sympathy for the murder of guiltless civilians by Arab terrorists, has decided not to put the assassins of Khartoum on trial. Kuwait is one of the principal sources of financial support for the Arab terror organizations, as well as a supplier of military equipment and arms to them. Algeria’s attitude towards Israel was formally expressed by President Boumediene, as follows: “The true freedom of the entire homeland must be won through the liquidation of the State of the Zionists.” Algeria’s Foreign Minister today gave expression to the same view when, inter alia, he spoke of the “original sin” of creating Israel and of Israel’s being an artificial State. 80. The position of the Sudan was defined by President Numeiri, as reported by Reuters on 2 June 1969: “The tnilitary leader of the Sudan, General Al-Numeiri today stated that his regime will work for the strengthening of the Arab nation with the purpose ‘to annul the results of aggression and put an end to Israel’s existence on Arab soil’.” 81. Kuwait’s fundamental policy has been expressed by its rejection of the Security Council’s cease-fire resolutions and of resolution 242 (1967). On 17 February 1969, tire Kuwaiti Foreign Minister declared that his Government rejected all peaceful solutions of the Palestine issue. At the plenary meeting of the General Assembly on 4 November 1970, the following declaration was made on behalf of Arab States, including Algeria and Kuwait: “ ‘Israel is composed preponderantly of transplanted, alien settlers, who have forcibly dispossessed and subjugated the indigenous Palestinian people and conquered and usurped its homeland. To contend, as the draft resolution does, that the recognition of the claims of Israel to the attributes and prerogatives of statehood ia indispensable for the achievement of a just peace is “ ‘Our respective Governments have categorically rejected, and continue to reject Security Council resolution 242 (1967) , . , on which draft resolution A/L.602/Rev.2 . . . is essentially based’.“4 “It is a simple fact of international life, however, that a refusal to negotiate on this ground is unprecedented and contrary to international custom and usage , , .‘I. 82. These are the defenders of international law and of the United Nations Charter. These are the Arab States which came today before the Security Council to speak of respect for the Council’s resolutions and their principles. Ambassador Goldberg continued to explain the crystallization of resolution 242 (1967): “The unanimous support for resolution 242 (1967) was the product in considerable measure of intensive diplomatic activity by the United States . . . The United States went all out diplomatically because we still hoped, first, to get a resolution, and second, to have all parties, pursuant to the resolution, negotiate an agreed and accepted settlement before positions congealed.” S3. The Security Council cannot ignore this attitude of the Arab States. Israel will not ignore it. The Government of Israel would be amiss in its international and national obligations if it did not remain at all times alert to the fact that Arab States continue to strive for the liquidation of the only independent Jewish State and preach this in the United Nations. Then he defined the resolution as follows: 84. How secondary must appear some of the questions touched upon in our discussion, at a time when the entire situation is overshadowed by the Arab objective to deprive the Jewish State of its freedom and equality with other natjons. “Resolution 242 (1967) does not explicitly require that Israel withdraw to the lines occupied by it before the outbreak of the war. The Arab States urged such language; the Soviet Union, as I have already mentioned, proposed this at the Security Council, and Yugoslavia and some other nations at the special session of the General Assembly. But such withdrawal language did not receive the requisite support either in the Security Council or in the Assembly. 85. It has been said that the Security Council is the only forum where all the parties of the conflict have been able to meet in the same room. If today’s appearances of Kuwait, Algeria and the Sudan, and the Algerian Minister’s insist- -I _ I ence that he should not be contaminated by the presence 01 the Israeli representative, are examples of such meetings in the same room, I am certain that those really desirous of peace would rather forgo them. “Resolution 242 (1967) simply endorses the principle of ‘withdrawal of Israel’s armed forces from territories occupied in the recent conflict,’ and interrelates this with the principle that every State in the area is entitled to live in peace within ‘secure and recognized boundaries’.” 86; At the meeting, on 7 June, I stated: “The notable omissions-which were not accidental-in regard to withdrawal are the words ‘the’ or ‘all’ and ‘the S June 1967 lines’. In other words, there is lacking a declaration requiring Israel to withdraw from ‘the’ or ‘all the’ territories occupied by it on and after 5 June 1967.” “Egypt’s Minister for Foreign Affairs asked . . . that the Security Council change resolution 242 (1967) and in particular to replace the establishment in agreement between the parties of secure and recognized boundaries by the Egyptian diktat to restore the insecure provisional old line of 1967; and to replace the call for a just settlement of the refugee problem, which appears in resolution 242 (1967) by a provision referring to the so-called Palestinian rights, implying in effect, as we heard yesterday, the dismemberment of Jordan, a State Member of the United Nations.” [1718th meeting, para. 104.1 88. There were two major attempts by the Arab States to gain the Security Council’s approval for their demand that Israel should withdraw from all the territories. One attempt was made in June 1967, the other in November 1967. In both instances the Council refused to endorse the Arab demand. Thus it rejected demands that Israel should withdraw its troops “behind the armistice lines” or “to the positions held before 5 June 1967”. Equally, demands that withdrawal should be “from all the territories” failed to gain the Council’s support. Even a formula that spoke of withdrawal “from the territories” was rejected. 87. It is important that we have a closer look at that resolution. A principle architect of resolution 242 (1967), Ambassador Arthur J. Goldberg of the United States, declared in a speech in Washington on 8 May of this year: lLThe record shows that even before the Six-Day War the Arab States were opposed, as they are now, to direct negotiations with Israel to settle their differences and to conclude a peace agreement. 89. In view of all these abortive efforts it is clear that the, absence of the word “all” or even of the definite article “the” from the withdrawal phrase is significant and purposeful. On 13 June 1967 the USSR representative 4 Ibid., 1897th meeting, para. 16. . . 4 “2. Demands that Israel should immediately and unconditionally remove ail its troops from the territory of those States”-that is, the United Arab Republic, Jordan and Syria-“and withdraw them behind the armistice lines and should respect the status of the demilitarized zones, as prescribed in the General Armistice Agreements.” / 1358th meeting, para. 45. / This Soviet draft was rejected by the Security Council at the 1360th meeting. 90. On 7 November 1967 the United Arab Republic requested an urgent meeting of the Council. The Council met on 9 November and the discussions that started then ended on 22 November with the adoption of resolution 242 (1967). The note to the President of the Council in which the United Arab Republic, today Egypt, requested the urgent meeting, said inter alia: “I have the honour. . . to request the convening of the Security Council in an urgent session to consider the dangerous situation prevailing in the Middle East as a result of the persistence of Israel not to withdraw its armed forces from all the territories which it occupied.. .“. [S/8226.] 91. Thus at the core of the request of the United Arab Republic was spelled out clearly, explicitly, the demand that Israel withdraw “from all the territories”. 92, In his opening address at the Council meeting the Egyptian representative urged that it was the “duty” of the Council “to force the . . . Israeli forces to return to the positions held before 5 June” /1373rd meeting, para. 831. 93. A comparison of the Egyptian demands as presented to the Council with the resolution actually adopted by the Council demonstrates the dimension and finality of the dismissal of the Arab demands. 94. On 7 November 1967, India, Mali and Nigeria submitted a pro-Arab draft resolution which, on the subject of withdrawal, required the following: “Israel’s armed forces should withdraw from alI the territories occupied as a result of the recent conflict”. (ibid., para. 91.1 95. On the same day, the United States also submitted a draft resolution which, on the subject of withdrawal, spoke of “withdrawal of armed forces from occupied territories”. It further spoke of “respect for the right of every State in the area to . . . secure and recognized boundaries”. [see S/8229.] 96. For a few days, discussions went on in the Council and behind the scenes without any version gaining enough votes for adoption. 98. The following is an account of the days preceding 22 November 1967. On 16 November 1967 [.2379th meeting), Lord Caradon, the representative of the United Kingdom, submitted a draft resolution. 99. On what happened immediately after the Council’s meeting in which Lord Caradon had submitted the United Kingdom draft, we read in The UN and the Middle East &v’s, 1967s by Arthur Lall, a former Ambassador of India to the United Nations: “V. V. Kuznetsov at once met with the Arab delegates, who told him that the formulation on the withdrawal of Israeli forces in the first operative paragraph of the British draft was not acceptable to them. They insisted that the wording read either that Israeli forces would be with. drawn from ‘all the territories’, instead of ‘territories’ occupied by Israel, or that Israel would ‘withdraw to the positions of 4 June 1967’. In addition, the Arabs were unwilling to accept the phrase ‘recognized boundaries’ also occurring in operative paragraph 1. . . I “The Arab States met on the morning of 17 November and took a dramatic decision. . . . The Arabs concluded that it was better to get a resolution backed by all 15 votes in the Council than to insist on a resolution which might not be adopted or which might obtain the bare minimum of nine votes. Several of them discussed matters with Caradon. Could he not use the formulation ‘all the territories’ instead of ‘territories’ in relation to the clause requiring Israel’s withdrawal? Caradon’s response was that his draft represented a delicate balance which would be upset by any changes.” 100. On 20 November 1967, four days after the British draft had been submitted, the USSR representative submitted his own draft resolution which, on the subject of withdrawal, said: “The Security Council, “2. Urges that . . .: “(a) The parties to the conflict should immediately withdraw their forces to the positions . . . held before 5 June 1967”. [1381st meeting, para. 7.1 101. This USSR draft once more attests how wide is the gap between the pro-Arab demands and resolution 242 (1967) that was ultimately adopted, and which speaks of withdrawal “from territories”. 102. Before the vote, Lord Caradon, sponsor of the draft about to be adopted, affirmed: “ . . . the draft resolution is a balanced whole. To add to it or to detract from it would destroy the balance and 5 New York, Columbia University Press, 1968. 108. On 1 July 1970, President Nixon stated: 103. The foregoing was the basis for the following summary made by Professor Eugene V. Rostow, Professor of Law and Public Affairs at Yale University who, at the time of the adoption of resolution 242 (1967), was United States Under-Secretary of State for Political Affairs: “Israel must withdraw to borders, borders that are defensible.” 109. On 12 July 1970, the Assistant Secretary of State, Mr. Joseph Sisco, declared: “ . . . paragraph 1 (i) of the resolution calls for the withdrawal of Israel armed forces ‘from territories OCcupied in the recent conflict’, and not ‘from the territories occupied in the recent conflict’. Repeated attempts to amend this sentence by inserting the word ‘the’ failed in the Security Council. It is therefore not legally possible to assert that the provision requires Israeli withdrawal from all the territories now occupied under the cease-fire resolutions to the Armistice Demarcation Lines.” “That resolution did not say ‘withdrawal to the pre-June 5 lines’. The resolution said that the parties must negotiate to achieve agreement on the so-called final secure and recognized borders. In other words, the question of the final borders is a matter of negotiations between the parties.” Again, on 7 May 1973, Mr. Sisco declared: “The Security Council did not call for unconditional Israeli withdrawal to the Armistice Lines as had been the case at the time of the 1956 war in Sinai. Rather, it called for ‘withdrawal . . + from territories occupied’ in the 1967 war as part of a package settlement in which the parties would agree to respect each other’s right to live in peace within secure and recognized boundaries, The Security Council resoIution established principles, it did not establish borders or define precisely the obligations of peace and security.” 104. Addressing the Security Council moments after the adoption of the draft resolution, Mr. Abba Eban, Israel’s Minister for Foreign Affairs, declared: “For us, the resolution says what it says. It does not say that which it has specifically and consciously avoided saying.” [ibid. para. 93.1 105. Of particular interest are the following statements reflecting the views of members of the Security Council regarding the withdrawal provision of resolution 242 (1967). 110. The United Kingdom, as the Council knows, was the sponsor of resolution 242 (1967). On 17 March 1969, Mr, Goronwy Roberts, Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office, in a reply to a question in Parliament said: 106. On 15 November 1967, Mr. Arthur Goldberg, the United States representative, said in the Security Council: “To seek withdrawal without secure and recognized boundaries, for example, would be just as fruitless as to seek secure and recognized boundaries without withdrawal. I-Iistorically there have never been secure or recognized boundaries in the area. Neither the armistice lines of 1949 nor the cease-fire lines of 1967 have answered that description, although the . , . Armistice Agreements explicitly recognize the necessity to proceed to permanent peace, which necessarily entails the recognition of boundaries between the parties. NOW SUCK boundaries have yet to be agreed upon. An agreement on that point is an absolute essential to a just and lasting peace just as withdrawal is. Secure boundaries cannot be determined by force; they cannot be determined by the unilateral action of any of the States; and they cannot be imposed from the outside. For history shows that imposed boundaries are not secure and that secure boundaries must be mutually worked out and recognized by the parties themselves as part of the peace-making process.” [1377th meeting, para. 6S.] “The Security Council resolution lays down certain principles which are required for the establishment of a just and lasting peace. These include ‘withdrawal of Israel armed forces from territories occupied in the recent conflict’ and the right of every side in the area to live in peace within ‘secure and recognized boundaries’. These boundaries will be determined in the context of a general settlement.” 111. On 17 November 1969, Mr. Michael Stewart, Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, in reply to the following question in Parliament, “What is the British interpretation of the wording of the 1967 resolution? Does the Right I-Ion. Gentleman understand it to mean that the Israelis should withdraw from all territories taken in the late war? “, stated: 107. On 10 September 1968, President Lyndon Johnson declared: “No, sir. That is not the phrase used in the resolution. The resolution speaks of secure and recognized boundaries. Those words must be read concurrently with the statement on withdrawal.” “We are not the ones to say where other nations should draw lines between them that will assure each the greatest stated: “As I have explained befork, there is reference, in the vital United Nations Security Council resolution, both to withdrawal from territories and to secure and recognized boundaries. As I have told the House previously, we believe that these two things should be read concurrently and that the omission of the word ‘all’ before the word ‘territories’ is deliberate.” 113. Mr. George Brown, British Foreign Secretary in 1967, at the time of the adoption of resolution 242 (1967), said in January 1970: “I have been asked over and over again to clarify, modify or improve the wording, but I do not intend to do that. The phrasing of the resolution was very carefully worked out, and it was a difficult and complicated exercise to get it accepted by the Security Council. I formulated the Security Council resolution. Before we submitted it to the Council we showed it to Arab leaders. The proposal said Israel will withdraw from territories that were occupied and not from ‘the’ territories, which means that Israel will not withdraw from all the territories.” 114. Mr. Harold Wilson, head of the United Kingdom Government that submitted the text of resolution 242 (1967), stated on 27 December 1972: “The Israel interpretation of the resolution was fully consistent with what the then British Government had meant. If our Government had meant ‘all’, we would have said ‘all’. We would have never wanted to say it anyway, and if we had it wouldn’t have been passed.” 115. Finally, in an interview on 10 February 1973, just a few months ago, Lord Caradon, the principal architect of resolution 242 (1947) declared: “Withdrawal should take place to secure and recognized boundaries, and these words were very carefully chosen: they have to be secure, and they have to be recognized. They will not be secure unless they are recognized. And that is why one has to work for agreement. This is essential. If we had attempted to draw a map, we would have been wrong. We did not. And I would defend absolutely what we did. It was not for us to lay down exactly where the border should be. I know the 1967 border very well. It is not a satisfactory border, it is where troops had to stop in 1948, just where they happened to be that night. That is not a permanent boundary.” 116. On 9 November 1967, Mr. George Ignatieff, the Canadian representative in the Security Council, declared in the Council: 117. Again on 9 November, Mr. Otto R. Borch, the Danish representative in the Security Council, speaking in the discussions which preceded the adoption of resolution 242 (1967), quoted a public statement of the Danish Minister for Foreign Affairs, Mr. Hans Tabor, as follows: “ ‘As we see it, the full implementation of these principles would include the withdrawal of Israeli troops; the safeguarding of the territorial and political integrity of all States in the area, including a final settlement of the borders in the area . . .‘.” (Ibid., para. 232.1 118. On 22 November 1967, Mr. Gerald0 de Carvalho Silos, the Brazilian representative, said: “We keep constantly in mind that a just and lasting peace in the Middle East has necessarily to be based on secure permanent boundaries freely agreed upon and negotiated by the neighbouring States . . .“. (1382nd meeting, para. 127.1 119. The views of those who criticized certain provisions of resolution 242 (1967) also throw light on the meaning of the resolution. Thus, the Soviet representative, Mr. Kuznetsov, said in the discussion: . * . phrases such as ‘secure and recognized boundaries’. what does this refer to? What is behind the idea of ‘secure and recognized boundaries’? Who is to decide how secure these boundaries are and who has to recognize them? . . . the draft . . . leaves the field wide open for different interpretations and constructions, . . . which still make it possible for Israel itself. . . to establish new boundaries and to withdraw its forces only to those lines which it considers appropriate.” f 1373rd meeting, para. 152.1 “ 120. Egypt’s Minister for Foreign Affairs has come to the Security Council to suggest in fact that resolution 242 (1967), which provided for the establishment of secure and recognized boundaries through negotiation and agreement, either meant the very opposite of what it said or was illegal and has to be modified. All those who interpreted the resolution as members of the Security Council that sponsored and adopted it, and even those who criticized it did, were in his view wrong. That is, of course, an utterly groundless thesis, especially as resolution 242 (1967) was accepted by both parties. Even if Governments that had voted for the resolution were to modify their political views regarding one or another aspect of the situation, they could not now change the meaning of the resolution without destroying it. 121. Negotiation and agreement to determine secure and recognized boundaries where none had existed is a necessity. Negotiation and agreement on border changes, even when secure and recognized boundaries do exist, is not unusual. That is particularly so in a situation of war. That is especially so when changes in the old lines are required by the State which did not initiate the war but has been 127. Egypt and Jordan are agreed that the Israeli occupation must end and that Israel should withdraw completely from all the Arab territories occupied. They agree in their interpretation of the Charter of the United Nations, in their interpretation of the responsibility of the United Nations and in their interpretation of the provisions of Security Council resolution 242 (1967), with respect to both the non-acquisition of territory by war and the provision for Israel’s withdrawal from the occupied territories. 122, True, progress towards such agreement has been slow. But this is not a justification for destroying the only common ground, unless, of course, one wishes to create a void that would entail also the undermining of Israel’s commitments on the basis of resolution 242 (1967). Giving verbal satisfaction to a partisan view in disregard of its merits may be a valid consideration in ordinary situations. It is not in questions of war and peace, especially when an effort is being made to terminate the most protracted war in this century in the entire world. Such an effort requires patience and circumspection, a search for that which unites, and not the creation or solidification of divisive elements. 128. What one Egyptian editor, or any editor anywhere in the world, says about the future and about what formulas shouId be adopted for the future of the area and the restructuring of relationships among the Arab countries and the Arab people is the right of any editorial writer or any spokesman of any point of view. But officially and on the major principal points, we are agreed that the Israeli occupation should end. 123. Every State member of the Security Council has its individual interests in the Middle East. Israel appeals to all members of the Security Council to allow the paramount interest of peace to prevail. None of you carries the burden of a 2,000.year struggle to retrieve freedom and equality and restore independence, None of you has known what it means to be under constant assault for 25 years. None has had to face for a quarter of a century an enemy seeking total destruction and annihilation of his nation. DO not make it more difficult for us to terminate this war. Do not make it more difficult for us to establish secure boundaries, which had never existed before between Israel and the Arab States, so that there can be peace at long last in the Middle East. 129. However, reference made to Jordan’s composition deserves some brief remarks. Jordan is a unique and special composition, which is based on objective social, economic, cultural and geographical realities and on consent and common popular will. It was the people of East Jordan who lived with their brothers to the west through every moment of struggle and agony under the British Mandate. It was the sense of brotherhood and common destiny which sent the appeals from the west of the river in 1947 and 1948 and brought the response from their brothers in the east, creating on the hills of Palestine and on the walls of Jerusalem an epic of heroic struggle and martyrdom in the face of a ruthless foreign invasion. The unity of the East and West Jordan Arabs in 1949 was not only a natural, though historic event, but also a response to a common danger unprecedented in its vehemence and scale.

In connexion with the comment made by the representative of Israel on the questions put by the representative of Egypt, it should be noted that all Members of the United Nations have the right to put questions, and of course the right of reply, in any organ of the Organization in whose meetings they are taking part. Consequently, it is a perfectly normal procedure for Mr. El-Zayyat to put questions. 130, The Palestinians on the West Bank were pioneers in the search for Arab unity and in the recognition of the unfolding menace when they elected to join with their brothers in the east in a constitutional union. The Jordanians of the east were merging their destiny with the cause of Palestine when they joined willingly in the great enterprise, The new Jordan, which emerged in 1949, was the creation of the Palestinians of the West Bank and their brothers in the east, While Israel was the negation of the Palestinian right of self-determination, unified Jordan was an expression of it, When the cabinet, parliament, the armed forces, the national administration, the economy and the social organizations are shared equally without discrimination between the Palestinians of the west and their 125. The representatives of Jordan and Kuwait have asked to speak in exercise of the right of reply. I call on the representative of Jordan, to speak in exercise of his right of reply.

It has certainly been a painful experience for the members around this table to see the serenity and moderation of the atmosphere created by the constructive and restrained statements made by the 1.5 131. It does not help for the Israeli representative to ignore these facts. The Palestinian identity has an Arab content. The Palestinian identity is not a rejection of the natural link with the Arab nation. It is a rejection of Israel’s attempt to empty Palestine of its Arabs and to de-Arabize the remaining subjugated Palestinians. All Arabs are in favour of the real self-expression of the Palestinian identity in the land of Palestine. Only Israel is opposed to it. 132. The Jordan Government has repeatedly said since 1967 that, in the context of an Israeli withdrawal from all the Arab territories in the framework of the Security Council resolution and a just and lasting peace, its citizens on the West Bank will be granted their right to a full constitutional expression of their choice. However, the important fact before this Council is that the occupation should end, that territorial aggrandisement should not hide itself behind outwardly juridical arguments, that the Security Council should take into its hands the case of the people under occupation and decisively act to end this occupation. These are the terms of reference of the United Nations and its various organs. They are also the terms of reference of the Security Council resolution which we have accepted. While the juridical aspect of the provision for withdrawal may be answered by saying that the interpretation of this concept of “no acquisition of territory by war”-which we accept, which Egypt accepts and which the overwhelming majority of the nations represented in this Organization accept-is a matter which we may be able to elaborate on at a later stage, it is clear and obvious to this Council that territorial aggrandizement should be rejected and that the immediate issue before the Council is to act positively and to protect the serenity, the moderation and the construe tive atmosphere of the Council against any attempt to divert its attention from the major issue and to detract from the dignity and restraint with which its affairs must be conducted. We have a positive task before us. We in Jordan are looking forward to a positive result from this Organization, a positive result that would establish peace and justice in our area, and we are committed to that goal.

I invite the representative of Kuwait to take a place at the Council table to speak in exercise of the right of reply.

It is very unfortunate and rather inappropriate that I come here and appear on this solemn occasion immediately after the rape of the most sacred principle in international law. The sanctity of States has just been raped. President Eisenhower said in February 1957: “Should a nation which attacks and occupies foreign territory in the face of United Nations disapproval be allowed to impose conditions on its own withdrawal? If we agree that armed attack can properly achieve the purposes 135. In fact it was my original intention to put some questions to the representative of Israel, the gentleman on my right, but it is now too late, after the rape, the pollution, the defiling and the reviling of the most sacred principle. However, I will speak on one point. Every time any reference is made to the rights of the Palestinians, all of a sudden the rights of the Jews emerge. I heard with interest what the representative of Israel said. This chamber, I submit, is already congested with vehement emotionalism about the rights of the Jews. Curiously enough, no mention was made of the rights of the Palestinians by the spokesman who ardently, emotionally and strongly defends Jewish rights. Injustice against Arabs or against Jews spawns the same bitterness, creates the same grievances. Is it right to alleviate the Jewish plight by inflicting another plight on the Palestinians? Are the Palestinians less human than the Jews? Did the misery of the Jews justify the misery of the Palestinians? Those are serious questions which should be properly diagnosed and settled. The Palestinians have the same right to live in dignity and in conditions worthy of human beings. There will not be even a flicker of hope for peace if the rights of the Jews mean the denial of the rights of the Palestinians. 136. Professor Arnold Toynbee said: “Right and wrong are the same in Palestine as anywhere else. What is peculiar about the Palestine conflict is that the world has listened to the party that has committed the offence and has turned a deaf ear to the victims.” 137. The New York Times reported on 18 May 1973 that in an interview with some Palestinians one of them said: “They say ‘Shalom’ means ‘peace’. They kick you out and take what you have and say ‘Shalom’. Let them give me back my house and land, and then I will say ‘Shalom’.” Another said: “I went back last year. They told me I couId not go into the groves, which were in bad shape, because it was a military area. There was a big fence around it. At my family house I found Romanian immigrant Jews living one family to a room. They told me to get out.” 138. It is this intensity of feeling of the Palestinian people for their country that should flutter the dovecote. Any search for justice is futile unless the sufferings of the Palestinians are taken seriously into account and eliminated. 139. The late Dr. Judah Magnes, who was eulogized by President Weizmann as a great Zionist and who was at one time a rector of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem wrote: “As far as I am concerned, I am not ready to achieve justice to the Jew through injustice to the Arab. . . , I “The tragedy of Palestine has become a time-bomb far too serious for the world to be simplistic about or to accept partisan viewpoints. However reluctantly, we must today look squarely at the Middle East with open eyes. To do less is to indulge in fearful folly. “It is the root-injustice of a people, the Palestinians, having been deprived of their homeland, which underlies these acts of horror. We must face this injustice and eliminate it.” 147, The PRESIDENT (translation from Russian): The representative of Saudi Arabia will be the next to speak in exercise of the right of reply. I invite the representative of Saudi Arabia to take a place at the Council table. 141. A reference was made to my country with regard to resolution 242 (1967) and I think I have never been more convinced of the soundness of our policy than I am today. We have always said that resolution 242 (1967) does not concern us-we are a thousand miles away-and we maintain that policy. Today, I would confirm that we will not accept, we will not entertain, we will not tolerate the raping, the violation, of the sacred principle of nonacquisition of territory by force.

Mr. President, I thank you for allowing me to take the floor, not to make a statement on behalf of my Government but to exercise my right of reply as someone who was a personal witness not only to the partition of Palestine in 1947 but to the concoction in this chamber by some members of the Council of so-called resolution 242 (1967). Since Mr. Tekoah waxed long in his muItifarious interpretation of that resolution, I find myself constrained to tell the Council what went on behind the scenes, rather than indulging in the sort of platitudes which were adduced by Mr. Tekoah, who quoted Presidents, Foreign Ministers, writers, ambassadors-mostly from those countries that were in favour of the creation of the State of Israel. 142. I would conclude with an interesting quotation from an article written by Professor Yehoshua Arieli, head of the Department of History at Hebrew University in Jerusalem. He wrote-and this was reported in New York Review of 3 1 August 1972: “It is this policy, it is this short-sighted opportunism and manipulation of the international situation which is called by many ‘shrewd realism’ or ‘realpolitik”‘.-Of course, he was referring to the policy of Israel.-“This is the kind of diplomacy that has brought the world in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries to the threshold of self-destruction through unceasing war and confrontation, with unceasing violence on all sides.” 149. I believe, if my memory does not falter, that Mr. Tekoah mentioned Mr. Arthur Goldberg, our erstwhile colleague, and also Mr. Rostow, who was an adviser to the then President of the United States; he was in the State Department; he held a high position in the United States Government.

I now call on the representative of Egypt, who is the next to speak in exercise of the right of reply. 150. I do not want to go into great detail, but it fell to me at one time to attend a meeting with none other than the late President Johnson in Washington, when one of the Ministers of His Majesty was asked to see the President on another crisis in the Middle East. I remember-and this is for the record-that His Majesty asked that no one be present except his Ambassador in Washington and that Minister who came from abroad and myself.

The logic of the representative of Israel surprises us, to say the least. He speaks about “safe and recognized boundaries” for Israel. Of what boundaries is he talking: those of 1947, 1948, 1949, 1956 or 1967? When certain States recognized the State of Israel they recognized it with boundaries that were defined in the partition plan-in other words, within a territory that had been allocated to it by a United Nations resolution, and nothing more. 151. Pressure was brought to bear on none other than President Johnson to have one of his aides-and I am not going to mention names now-present. And that is why the whole meeting produced nothing, because we could not even talk in confidence with the President since the one who attended was a Zionist. 145. The representative of Israel does not understand that. He talks about boundaries which, 1 believe, are swelling day by day and year by year. We are faced with a State whose boundaries are in a constant state of change, and this change is to be effected at the expense of Israel’s neighbours-that is to say, at the expense of Syria, Egypt and Jordan: that is Israeli logic. 1.52. I must set the record straight. When Mr. Goldbergwhom I have known, and my personal relationship with him was excellent-was appointed the Ambassador of the United States to the United Nations many of my colleagues 153. It was a very difficult task for me. But I remember that there was a meeting of this Council in an attempt to broach the question of Viet-Nam or some similar question-1 say that so that I may not be mistaken if my memory falters-and I spoke to Mr. Goldberg. It was only a couple of weeks after he was appointed. I met him, and he assured me that he would not mix his representation of the United States with any matter that might touch on his own predilections, and that he was not a Zionist-or at least he gave me to understand that, but not in so many words. 154. But later I took issue personally with Mr. Goldberg and also with my good friend Lord Caradon, who represented the United Kingdom at that time, and with others, when I was shown a draft of that resolution and I said that it reminded me of the term “national home”, which in the days of Balfour was judiciously selected. And what for? So as to keep the question fluid at that time to suit the imperialist United Kingdom of those days, because had it not been for the Zionists, Britain would have been beaten by Germany in 1917. 155. Who railroaded the United States into the First World War? Who? The record is there. The historians have written it. I do not want to rehash what has happened. But in order not to digress, the term “national home” was agreed upon by the Rothschilds because they were afraid that if they bad inserted “a State”, “a Jewish State”, one day perhaps the British would be fed up with Zionist activists and they might tell the Rothschilds: “Now you are a Jew, go to Palestine. You have a State there”. 156. The Rothschtids were wise enough to impress BaIfour with the words “national home”. And now, instead of “national home”, we have a parallel in resolution 242 (1967), in what we call the definite article “the”: “the territories”, or “territories”. That is the crux of the question, as if the whole question of the Middle East revolved around “the” territories or the absence of the “the”. 157. Why do you not tell us, Mr. Tekoah? I do not have any quotations, I am talking now from memory, having been seized of this question since I was 17. I need not quote. I have lived with it. You talk about anti-Semitism. We are the Semites. This is a European colonial movement hatched in Eastern Europe and Central Europe. Its protagonists are no more Semites than I am a Buddhist. In fairness to you, like others, the leaders of Israel are secular. 1.58. But you are playing on the sentiments of your co-religionists in order to use them,, For what? In order to establish in that important part of the world a base for economic expansion, not only of the Middle East but of the 159. I remember a Jew in London who told me a story a long time ago. He was the son of a tailor. It was not his father, but he told me that there was a Jewish tailor whose son, like all Jewish sons, was sent, by the sweat of his father’s brow, to the university to study. And he went info the world, and his father told him: “My son, now I worked hard. Go out into the world and make money. Make it honestly if you can, but if you can’t, make it anyway”. And you want to stay there in the Middle East anyway. 160. Nobody is chasing you from the Middle East. YOU chased the people of Palestine from the area. Forget that they are Arabs. They are the indigenous people of Palestine, and the last time I told you, Mr. Tekoah, across this table, that my humble research of the area has shown that many of those Palestinians had originally been Jews before they embraced Christianity and subsequently Islam, and that the Diaspora consisted not of the bulk of the population of Palestine but of the influential and wealthy during the time of Rome, after the Temple was destroyed. 161. It is just like what happened, unfortunately, durhg the days of Hitler. Who left Germany but the influential and the wealthy? There would not have been any more Jews to persecute or, deplorably, to maltreat and to murder if they had all left. It is the Diaspora which you have always exploited since the days of the late Mr. Shertok, who later called himself Sharett-and I knew him. “We are the Jews in the world that are persecuted and we should come back.” But as I told you, that movement, Zionism, is not a movement of our Jews who are Arabs like us, who speak Arabic and not Yiddish. It is a movement that has a motivation for a political and economic end, and, as I have mentioned time and time again, Mr. President, politics revolves around economics. You told me at one time, “This is Marx,” and I told you, “This was before Marx, it has nothing to do with Marx”. These people want Palestine as a base for developing economically and financially three continents and, across the Atlantic, the United States. Why do you not, my good friend the representative of the United States, create New York as the 51st State? I am sure that many Jews in Israel would flock here. Why support them 6,000 miles away from your shores’? You think you are serving your own interests? Of course, the! permeated your legislature. Seventy-eight senators go ant! kow-tow-to whom? To Israel. Mr. Fulbright was quotcJ by the Egyptian Foreign Minister-I can cite chapter and verse. He is a lone voice in the wilderness, What have WC done to you, the United States? We have not dune anything to you. Why are you sending Phantoms and atI those arms to chastise the Arabs? To keep the balance uf power? Why keep the balance of power between you ant! the Soviet Union? You are on good terms with the Soviet Union. Mr. Brezhnev is coming here, and I believe we are interrupting these meetings until Mr. Nixon anil Mr. Brezhnev can come to agreement or no agreement. 163. Sometimes something is said in jest but is meant seriously. I mentioned this on the question of Lebanon which was brought here before the Council. It is the duty of the United States and the Soviet Union to put an end to that conflict whether or not Mr. Brezhnev and Mr. Nixon agree on a concerted policy, and I mentioned this on another occasion when I took the floor, My good friend Ambassador Huang, who happened to be my neighbour in the seating, made it clear to me that the Chinese would like to see the Arabs take their rights. But that, after all, is up to the two countries. The Chinese do not arrogate to themselves being a super-Power, but whether you like it or not you Americans and the Russians happen to be the super-Powers in our area. Why do you not come to some agreement? Why should we be the victims? Why, as I said, should we be the checkerboard on which you play your chess game, not with wooden pieces but with the destiny of nations-including the Jews, because after all the Jews are human? Do not get me wrong, we harbour no ill-will. 169. The Zionists are bringing pressure on your country, Mr. President, to send them immigrants. I wonder sometimes whether the Russian immigrants may not become pilots and man the Phantoms from the United States to chastise us. Laugh, yes, laugh, you are 6,000 miles away from us Mr. Representative of the United States. I am an Arab and I have the right to tell you what we think. I am representing the ethos of my people. 170. Here you sit smug and complacent. You are all honourable, as Imentioned time and again, wearing the strait jackets of instruction of those who are behind you. And we people, not only in the Arab east but in the Moslem world-draw a line from Morocco to the confines of China, it is a Moslem world-but for that enclave which was baptized Israel. You want a raison d’btre for your intervention in the area. You do not have to do that. Ask us for what you want? You want oil? We are selling you oil. You make a big issue of that oil in your papers. Oil, oil-1980. 164. Somebody asked me this morning-I do not want to mention names-“What is happening, is there anything new? ” I said, “Yes, there is a revolution”. He said, “Where? “, I said, “In the Security Council, the revolution of a wheel that turns and turns and turns, and because of the obstruction of those who usurped the Holy Land, it draws neither oil nor water for that matter-it is hot air that is drawn.” 1’71. I told you here in the Council the other time that not only American currency is eroding but Western currency is eroding-I do not know about the rouble. But Western currency is eroding. Why. 7 Because of the pressures of the population; because of two world wars; because after the Second World War there were two other wars. And here the press, which to a large extent is manipulated, if not owned, by the Zionists, says that the Arabs are creating a monetary crisis and that in 1980 they will be able to throttle the United States because of the energy crisis. 165. I have been here, my dear friend Ambassador Malik, since the beginning and I have had the privilege of knowing you as a person. And 1 must take courage, having known you, to crave your indulgence in letting me be frank because words that have been used time and again in clich&, stereotyped phrases, will later bring down this Organization unless there is goodwill and a change of policy among the major Powers who exercise or wield world power. 172. Your currency, whether in Europe or here, eroded because you embarked on military adventures that made you bankrupt as nations, because you had colonial territories which you could no longer control except by great expenditures. But you create certain impressions to mislead whom? The people of the world? And the people of the world will not be misled. The people of the world one day will wake up. And I would be the first-1 hope I will not be alive-to ,fmd, because of the pushiness of the Zionists, that Jews would be made the scapegoat. This is not the first time in history, although you had nothing to do with certain ills of the world. Oh, they say, “Those Jews, they have always been at the base of mischief.” YOU are a minority in the world and you have created a world problem. Good Lord, every day when you take the paper you see nothing except the question of Zionism. Ten, ftiteen, twenty per cent of the space in the papers, and you are 16 millions or so in the world. People are fed up. The whole world over they are fed up. 166. Have we not seen what happened after the First World War partitioning-partitions that backfired? Have we not witnessed what happened before the Second World War was over, what partition has caused in trouble, in wars such as in Korea, in Viet-Nam, in Palestine? I do not know whether it might not one day, unless the world Powers get wise, do so in Germany, which was partitioned. 167.. If the Zionists are imbued with the desire for peace-we are not such simpletons. You and I, Mr. President, are laymen in matters military, but we know and everybody knows that frontiers with five miles more or five miles less count for nothing with sophisticated modern weaponry, with missiles, with supersonic planes-such planes as the one you downed, the U-2, you remember-I 174. There will be no peace-and I humbly say that as one who had hoped that there would be world peace after two world wars-as long as we have adopted the old pattern of power politics and balance of power, with all due respect to countries, big and small. Because after all the small countries ape the big countries, unfortunately so. There is no hope for peace, let me warn you, unless the two major Powers come to some agreement. We do not want you to coerce, to bring pressure, because we are against pressure. To bring pressure? I say, no. To persuade the Zionists that it is neither in their interests nor in the interests of world peace to keep plugging for what they have done. 175. After all, the Zionists are no exception. They are enamoured of power. I mentioned three things in one of my speeches in the General Assembly, when U Thant asked me to speak on the twentieth anniversary of the Declaration of Human Rights. Three things that people tight for-not equal rights, they are privileges. More wealth than my neighbour. The Zionists are wealthy. They have a thousand millionaires going to Israel, each one pledging a million dollars. That is a billion dollars. What for? To put it in the bank there? To exploit the occupied lands-laying one’s hands on the land, as we say in Arabic. 176. The second thing that enamours people is power. And the Zionists are drunk with power. They are no exception. They are human. And then, when there is power, glory-glory, glory, hallelujah. 177. Seventy-five thousand marched yesterday in the streets of New York and the Ambassador of Israel to the United States saluted the parade. United States, open the doors of New York, draw out a charter and call it “Jew York”. I wiIl live here and eat kosher food with you. You sent them to us so that in the long run they and we suffer. Not I personally, but the common people. Not Mr. Tekosh, not the leaders of Israel, because when things get hot it is the influential and the wealthy that give their heels to the air, as they had done in Germany and as they had done elsewhere, whether Jew or Gentile. And I am talking simply from humanitarian motives. Jews are human beings. We do not want to see them suffer. But we do not want to see them not only tread on our toes but exploit us. Why are we afraid of exploitation? Well, I remember I came to this country in 1939 and I asked a banker, out of curiosity, “Do the Jews here in this town, where they are great in number, own real estate? ” He told me, “No, they like to be liquid.” After 33 years almost three quarters of the skyscrapers are theirs. More power to them. 178. The Zionists could have gone peacefully to Palestine. If they had really been motivated by religious sentiment, 179. We do not live by bread alone. Progress is not necessarily human; it may be inhuman. 180. One day you will suffer-I am not saying this by way of prophecy, because it will come from within, when you get too drunk with power and wealth. And you are soliciting contributions from all over the world. I now show you a publication some Jews have sent me. They are against the Zionists. I am not going to read all this. These are Jews: “Neturei Karta of U.S.A. (Guardians of the Holy City)“. I now quote them: “Zionist propaganda-clever, sustained, well-financed”. Can anyone refute that? And Jews wrote this, not Baroody. It says: “Zionist propaganda-clever, sustained, well-fmancedhas succeeded in misleading many Americans, Jews and non-Jews alike.” And if you let them, they will do the same thing in the Soviet Union. “We, as Jews, therefore find it necessary to declare solemnly: “(1) Jews do not need a State of their own in our time. The very establishment of such a modem ‘Jewish’ state is a grave violation of Jewish tradition and law . . .“. I shall not read the whole paragraph. “(2) Jews are enjoined by their religious laws to be loyal to the country of which they are citizens.” 181. I once asked a couple of Senators-I shall not name them, for I do not want to embarrass them; I had known one of them for many years-“Are you an American or an Israeli? ” One said, “I am a’Jew, and I am for Israel. l3ut I am an American.” I said, “How can you split loyalty?” And the other Senator told me the same thing. I am not making this up. 182. The publication continues: “(3) Jews, who are loyal to their faith and tradition, have nothing to do with Zionist-sponsored boycotts against individual enterprises or against entire nations. . . . “Zionist politicians and their fellow travellers do not speak for the Jewish people: indeed, the Zionist conspiracy against Jewish tradition and law makes zionismand all its activities and entities-the arch-enemy of the Jewish people today.” 183. And one last word-time is running short, but, after all, I remember us staying here much later on other questions not of the same momentous impact as this question of the Middle East. I should like to touch upon the religious argument. Mr. Tekoah has time and again said-and I remember Mr. Eban saying the same thing when he used to orate in the General Assembly, and other 190. And you, Mr. Tekoah and Mr. Eban, you are all well educated. You know in your innermost hearts that these are gimmicks, as the Americans say, that are used in order to brainwash and indoctrinate-who? The simpleminded-those of deep faith. In fairness to you, faith for what? To go and flock there so that you may use them for the development of Asia, Africa and eventuaUy Europe. YOU want to use them. The Rothschilds and the Montagues. I think the Montagues Anglicized their name. In my younger days they were the governors of the Bank of England. I have heard-and my colleague from the United Kingdom can correct me, he is young-that 90 members of Parliament, more or less, are Jews. Here in the United States they do not have to be Jews. Seventy-eight senators brandish the flag of Israel over the Congress of the United States. Why do you not, my good friend from the United States, make New York the 51st state and you will see how many Zionists will come here. The pressure from us wit1 be relieved, and you may put the Star of David as the Slst star. What is wrong with that? You had 13 stars during the Confederacy and then you took Texas from the Mexicans and you bought Louisiana from the French under the Louisiana Purchase. Why do you laugh? I would like to laugh with you to relieve the tension, because it is a tense situation. 184. The Zionists claim Jerusalem, and Jerusalem had existed before our Jews-who do not claim to be political Zionists but are spiritual Zionists, like those people I had quoted. 185. That is the geographical argument. The religious argument is, “God gave us Palestine, the Holy Land.” And they know that Israel and Judah existed a thousand or so years before Christ as small enclaves, and then the Romans came. I am not going to go into the history of the area. But one thing is certain: God does not parcel out land to any one people. If He did, He would himself be a discriminator. And then King David, who is the Prophet of all of us in the area-“Nabi Daoud”, as we call him in Arabic-said, “The earth is the Lord’s and the fulness thereof’. And some of you speak here of resolution 242 (1967) as though it is Moses’ eleventh Commandment. What is this whole chicanery, if I may use the term? Whom are we fooling? Not ourselves. You are all gentlemen of high intellect. If you were not, your Governments would not have sent you here to fill one of the most important posts in diplomacy, representative at the United Nations. 191. Neither by the religious argument nor by what you call the democratic argument can the Israelis claim authority over that land. All they want is peace for economic exploitation. That is why they do not want to withdraw. They have invested money in the Golan Heights; they have invested money in Sinai; they have been thinking of building canals through Egyptian territories. They want to use Arab labour there, which is cheaper. That is what they want. Mr. Tekoah says there is nothing wrong in this “because our standard of living is higher”. So what about the standard of living? Look at where there is a high standard of living. Look at the hot pants. Look at the permissiveness of progress. Progress does not mean civilization or culture. It may mean deterioration and decadence, and we do not want decadence in our midst. It will come to us, perhaps, sooner or later. We have had enough of decadence. 186. There happen to be three monotheistic religions: Judaism, Christianity and Islam. And Jerusalem-the Holy Land, as many call it-is holy to the three religions. 187. By what yardstick do you talk here about democracy, democracy, democracy? By what democratic yardstick should 16 million Jews have the land and 600 or 700 million Moslems not have the land, and one billion Christians have no authority over the land? By what democratic process? 192. If you want to live with us as Jews, you are welcome. But to lord it over us. . . . It is not for Baroody to say, but there are young men whom I saw and it breaks my heart to see that they have been aroused by the Palestinian youth, and one day they will make it difficult for our own Governments. They will revolt and anarchy will rule. What will happen to the oil? What will happen to the markets? They may go up in flames. No one knows what might happen-so that the Zionists may interpret resolution 242 (1967) the way they want. That is the crux Of the question. So please do not read chapter and verse to US from prefabricated replies. You are a gentleman who should know what the truth is in your innermost heart. I stand to be corrected if I am wrong. 188. And now the Zionists are using Judaism-a noble religion, mind you-as the motivation for political and economic ends. “And God gave us Palestine”. Show us the title deeds; show us the seal. You now say that the United Nations did not create you. Who created you? 189. “YOU retrieved the land you had lost”. And I have told YOU that the original Jews hailed from I-Jr of the Chaldees. What will prevent you from expanding to Western Iraq one day, saying, “Oh, Abraham, the patriarch of us all”-and he happens to be the patriarch of the Moslems too-“came from there, and therefore it is hallowed land. We should have Western Iraq.” Or “At one time Moses”- he was an Egyptian, mind you; you’ forget that-“was in the

Before calling on the next speaker on the list of those who wish to speak in exercise of the right of reply, I should like to make a comment as representative of the SOVIET UNION. The distinguished representative of Saudi Arabia has made very convincing, I would say sincere and convincing, appeals to the great Powers. But, as an old friend, I would ask and advise him to address his appeals instead to the patrons of Israel. We are not among their number. 195. Speaking as PRESIDENT, I call on the representative of Israel, for the second time, to speak next in exercise of his right of reply.

As you know, Mr. President, I asked to be allowed to exercise my right of reply before I realized that the speaker who preceded me would take the floor. I sm not in the habit of reacting to his statements. I leave it to his Arab colleagues to take care of them. As always, his pronouncement was the most convincing testimony of what Israel confronts and why Israel has to act in defence of its rights as it does. 197. I should simply like to make one observation regarding the statement by the representative of Egypt, Litho in United Nations, New York Price: $U.S. 2.00 (or equivalent in other currencies) 73-82001-May 1979-2,200 separated by cease-fire lines. Those are all military provisional lines. It is precisely because of the absence of State boundaries in the Middle East until now that the entire world, I think, expects that the Arab States and Israel will finally reach agreement determining where the secure and recognized State boundaries would be. 198. We are still waiting for an indication on the part of Egypt and other Arab Governments that they are ready to enter into negotiations to reach such agreement. 199. Finally, as the representative of Egypt attributed to Israel various aspirations regarding the ultimate location of these State boundaries, I would simply suggest to him that he look up another article of our good friend, Hassinin Heykal, a very close confidant, I believe, of Egypt’s President, who in AZ Ahram of 2 February 1968, wrote as follows: “What could prevent us from stating that the secure and recognized boundaries are one Jewish synagogue in Tel Aviv and 10 metres around it? ” T%e meeting rose at 7.20 p.m.