Futile Effort to Solve Mid-East Problems in N.Y....Israel Avoids Panic...Survey of Affected Areas By TERENCE PRITTIE zation of the world opinion by the put his new development projects Diplomatic Correspondent of the Arab states. east of the river Jordan, and away Guardian, London, Author of I Not only has Israel remained from the Israeli frontier. Popula- calm and consistent, refusing to tion has drifted east as a result. "Israel, Miracle in the Desert" budge from a yard of occupied In the last 20 years the population Nearly six months after the end territory until a solution of the dis- of Trans-Jordan has increased Of the Arab-Israeli Six Day War, pute is in sight. She has begun from 400,000 to 1,250,000; that of a settlement in the Middle East— contingency planning for those oc- the West Bank has gone down from in spite of the occasional hopeful cupied territories, believing that 800,000 to 700,000 (including east- remark from King Hussein of Jor- the war has created a political ern Jerusalem). To this dramatic dan and President Nasser of vacuum in the Middle East which change the refugee-exodus from Egypt — looks just about as far will not be filled by aimless dis- the West Bank this year accounted off as ever. By mid-November, in- cussions in the United Nations, for only 150,000, while the natural deed, Mohammed Hassanein Hey- and that she alone will be in a increase of population in the West lal editor of the Cairo newspaper position to take action. The Israelis Bank was probably around 300,000. Al Ahram and generally regarded have in fact, recognized a new re- The West Bank has a flourishing as Nasser's "mouthpiece," was an- sponsibility — for showing what nouncing the inevitability of an- can be achieved in a part of the agriculture, with big surpluses of other war with Israel. Heykal Middle East which has fallen un- fruit and vegetables. It could prob- claimed that the effort to find a der her control as a result of a ably grow enough wheat to make political solution of the Arab-Israeli war which she feared and wanted its own bread, although Hussein dispute had failed and that the to avoid. has — once again, with tactical Arabs should launch a four-pronged I suppose the problems of occu- objectives in view — grown the campaign in preparation for the pation, in order of difficulty of bulk of Jordanian grain east of the war to come. This should consist solution, are the Gaza Strip, the river Jordan. Israel's Economics in re - equipping and re - training West Bank, Sinai and the Golan Advisory Committee will certainly Arab armies, strengthening the Heights. Here is a survey of what advocate the introduction of indus- home front, unifying all Arab is being done in these areas, and tries into the West Bank. This fer- forces by a military pact, and win- what is being planned for them. tile area, with a comparatively ning over world opinion by skillful sophisticated population, is not only First, the Gaza Strip. There are and persistent propaganda. 350,000 Arabs penned into this capable of supporting itself; it Only two months earlier Heykal tiny area of 160 square miles, two- could absorb at least 20,000 from had struck the first blow in the thirds of them refugees. Gaza's the Gaza Strip. And, given better new Arab propaganda campaign natural function should be to be education, it could produce skilled with his article "Time to Talk—as the seaport of the southern half workers and administrators for Equals" in the London Sunday of Israel, the Negev. The city's the under-developed Arab countries. It is significant that the Israeli Times. In this article he preached detachment from Israel prevented peace and sought to split the this for the past 20 years, owing government is carrying out a major Anglo-American alliance by prais- to the Arab blockade and boycott road-building and improvement ing Britain and vilifying the United of Israel. The refugees have not program in the West Bank. The States. He was so sucessful that been allowed to take Egyptian current program provides for an the British Foreign Secretary. nationality or emigrate to Egypt expenditure of only $3,500,000. George Brown, immediately began proper. Nasser treated the area as Three main roads are being com- his effort to woo the Arab states a concentration camp and threw pletely renovated, and new east- and, in particular, Egypt. its inhabitants on the charity of west roads connecting the West The mounting tide of Arab propa- UNWRA. It is not too much to say Bank with Israel are being built. ganda has had its effect in the that the underfed, undereducated, Thousands of Arabs are being United Nations, too. It is signifi- imprisoned inhabitants of the Gaza given employment, but if Israel cant that the only clear-cut de- Strip were brought up, by Egyptian remains in possession of the West cision taken in the United Nations propaganda, with the single-minded Bank, a still bigger road-making since the Six Day War was to con- intention of hating Israel and work- program will be launched. The area demn the union of Jerusalem, by ing for her destruction. The sol- will be linked, in the most obvious 99 votes to none, with 18 absten- diers of the victorious Israeli Army way, more closely with Israel. This tions. The United Nations have were horrified to find that even is something which the Arabs, who become progressively so bemused eight year-old children there had are still refusing to talk to the by the complexities of the Arab- Israeli dispute that they came to see its main symptom as being Israel's post-war occupation of the Sinai Peninsula, the West Bank of the Jordan and the Golan Heights in Syria. The results of the war have become much more visible than its causes. To the United Nations the reversal of these results has begun to seem the logical method of reaching a settlement. The Israeli attitude since the war towards a possible settlement has remained absolutely consistent. Israel has never wavered from her demand for Arab-Israeli talks, the object of which should be a peace settlement entailing Arab recogni- tion of Israel and normal relations with her. Israel has never stated her peace terms, although it is fairly clear they would include the incorporation into Israel of eastern Jerusalem, with certain, far less important frontier rectifications, and the demilitarization of the Sinai Peninsula and, possibly, the West Bank. But the Israeli demand for talks has been stultified by the prevailing view in the United Nations, that a solution can be found in New York. This view has been supported by the Soviet Union in order to make mischief, by France in order to regain influ- ence in the Arab world, and by Britain in order to make the Arab states less dependent on the Com- munist Bloc. What is at once striking about Israel's reactions to this trend of international feeling is the lack of bitterness and the total absence of panic. Bitterness might have been expected, in view of the fact that Britain and France were for- mer allies, and that right up to the outbreak of the Six Day War Britain was thrown onto Israel's side by the Egyptian blockade of the Gulf of Aqaba. Panic could have been the result of the mobili- been taught to depict and describe Jews in a manner which would have delighted Adolf Hitler. Gaza is a social sink. But I found that the Israeli governmnet is in no way daunted by the prob- lem of dealing with Gaza. In the first place, Israel has made it pos- sible for the people of Gaza to visit the West Bank or, if they wish, to emigrate. Several hundreds have already emgirated. In the second place, the Economics Advisory Committee which the Israeli government has appointed is study- ing the possibilities of introducing light industries into Gaza. It will certainly come up with proposals for the future employment of up to 10,000 breadwinners. But the main Israeli contribution to Gaza's problems will be to in- crease vocational training. At pres- ent only 300 Arabs are being trained annually; the intention is to increase this, with some help from the outside world, to 5,000. Israel herself would probably be prepared to produce funds for at least 700 of these. In 10 years time one-third of Gaza's breadwin- ners could be trained for lucrative employment. The rest of the Arab world has a desperate need for trained workers of any kind. Gaza's population should be steadily siphoned-off, to the West Bank, to Israel, most of all to oil-rich Arab countries which can offer these people a real future. Israel will, if the present diplo- matic deadlock in the Middle East goes on, press steadily ahead with her plans for Gaza. It will be the hardest nut which Israel has to crack. But the West Bank, if not the hardest, is the biggest. Its population, leaving out eastern Jerusalem, is nearly 650,000. The West Bank has little industry (its industrial potential is 1% that of Israel, which has only four times as many inhabitants). King Hussein, understandably, Israelis, should take into account. Time is on the Israeli side, in the sense that economic progress favors the side which carries it through. Completion of Terence Prittie's Survey in next issue of The Jewish News THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS Friday, November 24, 1967-17 Make The &Nile Moue ! NY Official Honors Israeli War-Wounded "DEXTER CHEVROLET IS THE BEST PLACE TO GET YOUR CAR." • Better Service • Better Deals NEW YORK (JTA) — Roy Good- man, finance commissioner of the City of New York, reported, upon returning from Israel, that, on be- half of Mayor John V. Lindsay, he had presented medallions to Is- raelis wounded in last June's Six- Day war, "as a gesture of high esteem and sympathy of the people of New York." Goodman reported he had also presentedl , the municipality's sym- bolic key to the city to the A. S. Kay Home for Convalescents at Naharia, near Haifa. Slatkin's DEXTER CHEVROLET 20811 W. 8 Mile Road between Telegraph & Southfield KE 4-1400 "Gr` HEARING AID CENTER, INC. Authorized Dealer for M r. Delorenzo L ■ .ING SOUND r HEARING . AIDS Mr. Liebow Announces tie Opening of Our new Northland office, next to Providence h ospital, under the supervision of MARVI N LI EBOW Now, 2 locations to better serve the Northwest area and surrounding communities. ANTHONY'S HEARING AID CENTER INC. 19236 Grand River At Outer Drive Northland 9 Mi. Med. Bldg. 15901 W. 9 Mile Rd. KE 7-9880 358-1377 HARVEY M. DUBIN ANNOUNCES THE RELOCATION OF HIS INSURANCE OFFICE AT 16175 James Couzens Highway Detroit, Michigan 48221 IN ASSOCIATION WITH Detroit Home Agency Incorporated UNiversity 4-8140 UNiversity 4-1700 Insurance Since 1930 Life * Liability * sire * Automobile * Casualty