Below is the OCR text representation for this newspapers page.

ZOA wants Carter administration to ‘stand lirm’ Editor: After weeks of speculation, which resulted in considerable tension in Israel and pronounced anxiety within the American Jewish community. President Carter broke his silence when he stated on Aug. 12, 1979: “I am against any creation of a separate Palestinian State.” This came at the eleventh hour just as the American Jewish community had decided to mobilize its full strength in making clear to the Administration that the flirtation that appears to be in progress, which would give the PLO respectability, was an unaccept able alternative. Within 48 hours of the President’s new assurances, a sensational news story revealed that Andrew Young, America's Ambassador to the United Nations, had already conducted face-to-face meetings with the PLO representative at the U.N. On the heels of this revelation it is now confirmed that a second American diplomat, U.S. Ambassador Milton Wolf, in Austria, had also met with the PLO over a month ago. Andrew Young has “resigned." After explanations and denials, he admitted meeting with a representative of the terrorist Palestinian organization Although Young insisted that this action was unilateral and without sanction or knowledge of the Administration, it fits precisely into the pattern of developing American policy which has concerned the ZOA for some time. Andrew Young is a good public servant. He represented our nation during many difficult circum stances. He led the American Black community, as it struggled side by side with the Jewish community to achieve equality and civil rights for all people. This struggle has not been completed and the interests of the United States demand that all Americans work together in solidarity to achieve justice for all people and in all lands. The motivating factor which prompted Young’s action is unresolved. Yet, as The New York Times pointed out (Aug. 16, 1979), “It should be kept clear that he was not sacrificed to the demands of Israel or American Jews. Mr. Young, knowing that his government was passing messages indirectly to the Palestine Liberation Organization, decided at a diplomatically delicate moment to meet directly with the PLO at the United Nations. It was not protocol, but vital policy that Mr. Young betrayed.” While we commend the President’s reaffirmation of American policy, we cannot prematurely overlook the events that preceded the state of concern that had reached dangerous proportions. If we refer back to the days when President Carter first spoke about “Palestinian rights” and the Administration carried on what we believe was a campaign of intimidation against Israel in the negotiating period leading to Camp David, the combination of events since that time in context with other developments is very disturbing. To exacerbate the situation, Mr. Carter made a statement relative to the Palestinians and the Civil Rights Movement, which led to confused interpretation. This was sufficient to arouse considerable support from the pro-Arab elements, including the President of the American-Arab Relations Committee, M.T. Mehdi, who attempted to rationalize Palestinian terrorism in a letter to The New York Times. He degraded the memory of the beloved Martin Luther King by the suggestion that the civil rights leader and Yasir Arafat, the terrorist, shared views that were philosophically in agreement. 1 am also disturbed by what I have observed to be a trend in White House tactics. It seems that Mr. Carter makes statements critical of Israel, which create a negative reaction among Israel’s friends but which are never clarified by the President. Instead, his spokesperson, usually Vice President Mondale, is given the assignment of placating American Jews—after the fact. Hence, while the original statement stands, others in the Carter Administra tion proceed to soothe the wounds. However, the original statement is usually widely reported in the media and even if an effort is actually made to issue a “clarification," it does not receive the same attention. The original statement, therefore, has the more lasting effect on public opinion. It is important to recall that the United States has insisted that its role in the Middle East negotiations is that of impartial arbitrator. We have been told, time and again, that Mr. Carter planned to be objective and saw America’s role as helping the parties involved, Egypt and Israel, should there be problems in the negotiating process. The scenario of American policy is troubling. As it continues to unfold, it confirms the warnings we, the Zionist Organization of America, have given for many months. In spite of denials, the trend of the Carter Administration continues in the direction of seeking accommodation with the Palestine Liberation Organiza tion. It is our obligation to make clear to the White House and to Congress that present American policy is not acceptable to the American Jewish community, nor is the appeasement of PLO terrorists acceptable to the American people! I urge every friend of Israel to make his voice heart in Washington now—immediately! Because Administration policy is vulnerable to change, we must urge our Government to stand firm. Zionism, a movement for peace, is anxious for the Peace Treaty between Israel and Egypt to succeed. Hopefully, the Administration will avoid bringing into the process elements which will be destructive and counterproductive. Ivan J. Novick President, Zionist Organization of America Perceptions, misconceptions Editor: The central problem of the autonomy talks now underway is the perception of the PLO as a political entity. Since the Six Day War in 1967 OPEC has risen as a powerful political and economic body which largely reflects Muslim/Arabic political views. Arab countries, both on their own and through OPEC, have “legitimized" the PLO as a political entity representing the Palestinian people. This is confusing to Western observers for several reasons. First OPEC has no political standing to confer representation on any group. It is almost like the U.N. designating the Baader Meinoff gang to represent German interests in the Bundestag. Second, many of the Arab countries claiming to champion the PLO cause do so knowing that they did nothing to create a Palestinian state from 1948 to 1967 and they don’t want refugees in their countries now for fear that they (the Palestinian refugees) would destabilize the sensitive political situation that exists in most Arab countries. They need only recall King Hussein’s problems with the PLO in Jordan in the late 1960s. Third, almost none of the Arab countries understand the phenomenon of grassroots participation in representative government. Elections, if and when held in Arab countries, are held to ratify current political leaders and not to select between meaningful alternatives. In other words the designation of the PLO by Arab leaders is the latter’s preference which may or ma*' not be the preference of the Palestinian people who have never had the opportunity or means of formally expressing their choice. There is currently no political alternative to the PLO; it tolerates no opposition. Israel would dearly love to nurture a representative political alternative among West Bank Arabs. This is unlikely because current residents have nothing to lose by letting the PLO fight their battle and as a matter of pride they would not want to appear as lackeys of Israel. And finally even if they did have political ambitions, they would find it hazardous to proclaim opposition to the PLO given assassinations carried out against Gaza opposition. The problem for Israel is to negate the PLO as a political alternative. Israel is winning the military conflict with the PLO but is making no headway in world opinion. It all sounds disturbingly familiar in describing our experience in Vietnam Perhaps the West Bank is becoming Israel's Vietnam. I feel that too little attention has been paid to the political connotations of the PLO and that this is fast becoming a pivotal issue. There is an increasing sense of urgency on this issue and it will not go away by itself. The better we understand this issue the better we can deal with it individually and as a community in preventing the further erosion of needed U.S. support for Israel. Richard E. Lapin Scapegoat again? Editor: Once again we witnessed a thoroughly untimely demonstra tion of the lingering inferiority complex that appears to overcome Jewish leaders when confronted by black leaders with outrageous charges. Ted Mann's unmanly eagerness to mollify Jesse Jackson on the MacNeil/Lehrer show Thursday evening, Aug. 16, was to me embarrassing and ineffectual. So overcome by his desire to win Jackson’s favor that he twice failed to properly reply to the black leaders charge, to wit: “The Jews had no right to spy upon Andy.” Surely Mr. Mann should be aware that Israeli intelligence tailed the PLO representative and not Mr. Young. Mr. Young’s appearance at the same place and approximately at the same time is his problem, not the problem of Israeli intelligence. Moreover, Mr Young’s original version was false, his report to Mr. Vance was misleading and not until confronted by Mr. Yehuda Blum. Israel’s Ambassador to the U.N*, at Mr. Blum's initiative, did Andrew Young tell it like it was. In the face of these undisputed facts, why must the President olK American Jewish organizations cater to the-jpbvious one-sidedness of a Jesse Jackson? A leader of our community should be decently aggressive, adamantly forthright and persistently and insistently the champion of Israel and of his people. To recite the litany of our cooperation with the blacks in the long civil rights struggle, in a confrontation with a national black leader who knows well the record, is an exercise in futility and an exposition of weakness. The truth is that Andrew Young failed in his task of representing the American people in its entirety, not just one segment. To equate our democracy, imperfect as it may be, with Castro, Nkomo, Khomeini and the PLO is sheer nonsense. To call Khomeini a saint (a despotic murderer would be closer to the mark), Cuban mercenaries a stabilizing force in Africa, Nkomo a democratic influence, the PLO freedom fighters, and his own country a prison house for 1 political dissidents, is evidence of an incurable blindness to the realities and facts of life. His failure is being obfuscated by all the national black leaders (with the possible exception of the great Bayard Rustin) and by Mr Young himself. To make the Jews the scapegoat for his failure is a time-worn technique of demagogues. The veritable barrage of abuse directed against us tmust be fought courageously and boldly, we must be forthright in taking our stand and we must not degrade our position and ourselves with thinly veiled apologetic appeals to our record of support for civil rights. The face we show to demagogues must be adamant and defiant. R. M Travis P«fe 5 THE SOUTHERN ISRAELITE August 24, 1979