Annotations for Speaker: Wallace

Good evening... Tonight we go after a story that has been thousands of years in the making, the story of Israel, a country which celebrates its Tenth Anniversary this month. Our guest... Abba Eban, Israel's Ambassador to the United States and its Chief Delegate to the United Nations.

If you're curious to hear Ambassador's Eban's views on the recent mergers by Arab nations which are hostile to Israel, his views on on Egypt's President Nasser and the Arab refugee problem, on American Jewry, and the charge that Israel threatens world peace with a policy of territorial expansion, we'll go after those stories in a moment. My name is Mike Wallace, the cigarette is Parliament.

All over the Middle East too, though, will you not find that the huge majority of the Arab people are interested in the extermination of Israel?

And now to our story... Abba Eban, Israel's Ambassador to the United States, is a scholar, a linguist, a persuasive orator, a veteran statesman at the age of forty-three. He has been called "The Voice of Israel," which is also the title of his book. Tonight, in order to clarify Israel's problems, her hopes and her aspirations, we shall put to Ambassador Eban questions raised by Israel's critics; some of them, by her enemies.

Do you think that we are currently going through a lull before the storm? Our former secretary of the Air Force Thomas Finletter told Zionist leaders in America, just a month ago that the present Middle East situation is a lull before a possible storm and he added that we have good reason, he said, to be apprehensive over the ultimate direction of the Arab mergers.

Ambassador Eban, in a moment, I would like to ask you about the role of the American Jew in Israel's and Zionism's future. According to a leading anti-Zionist here in the United States, Rabbi Elmer Berger, "The Zionist-Israeli axis," he says, "Imposes upon Jews outside of Israel, Americans of Jewish faith included, a status of double nationality which he charges "Is both artificial and dangerous" In a moment, I'd like to get your opinion on that charge.

Mr. Ambassador, in its... ten years as a nation, Israel has been involved in repeated violence: major border incidents, two open wars with the Arabs, the first in forty-eight the last in fifty-six. What do you foresee for the next ten years? Do you foresee continuing violence?

And we'll get Abba Eban's answer in just sixty seconds.

Well... a lull... will emerge into a climate more conducive to peace if perhaps some of the issues behind the Arab-Israeli hostility can be settled. Let's take a look at them. First, the refugee problem: An estimated seven hundred thousand Palestinian Arabs were left homeless during the Arab-Israeli war of '48.

Israel refuses to readmit them; they live in bitterness and such men as historian Arnold Toynbee has said this, "The evil deeds committed by the Zionist Jews against the Arabs are comparable to crimes committed against the Jews by the Nazis." How do you feel about that?

Now then, Mr. Eban, regarding the American Jew and the State of Israel, as I said, the anti-Zionist Rabbi, Dr. Elmer Berger, has written, "That the Zionist-Israeli axis imposes upon Jews outside of Israel, Americans of Jewish faith included, a status of double-nationality" a status which he deplores. What's your answer?

You say that you "Hope" for peace. Back in September '56, you called Egypt's President Nasser, Israel's most perilous adversary. Now today Colonel Nasser would seem to be even stronger; he is the head of the merged Egyptian and Syrian nations, he is apparently regaining the friendship of Saudi Arabia; the populations, if not the leadership, of Jordan and Iraq look to him for inspiration. How does this all affect Israel?

What?

I thank you, sir, for coming and spending this half hour with us. I congratulate you upon your Tenth Anniversary.

Your own Prime Minister David Ben Gurion wrote back in 1953 this, he said, "When a Jew in America speaks of our government to his fellow Jews, he usually means the government of Israel, while the Jewish public in various countries view the Israeli ambassadors as their own representatives." Wouldn't that appear anyway to support Rabbi Berger's statement?

The State of Israel was conceived ten years ago, in hope. It has lived in good measure in peril. In the future, if it is to survive and realize its dream of plenty, it must live in peace. To that the free world says, "Amen."

Of course, the problem of the refugees is allied with the problem of territorial expansion on the part of Israel. A major Arab spokesman here in the United States Dr. Faid Sai says this: He says, "The area of the territories held by Israel today exceeds by about 40 percent the area of the territories given Israel by the United Nations. Most of this added area, "he says" was taken by force and should therefore be relinquished by Israel."

Would a Jew, in your estimation, would a Jew be any the less a Jew if he were opposed to Zionism and to Israel?

In a moment, I'll bring you a rundown on next week's guest, a man of whom it has been said: "He walks the razor's edge between genius and madness."

I still, if I may say so, sir, do not feel that you have been responsive to that question. Can a Jew be a good Jew and still be opposed to Zionism and to Israel?

Next week we go after the story of one of the most unusual men of our times: A modern artist who boasts "The only difference between me and a madman is that I am not mad." You see him behind me, he is Salvador Dali, who has both outraged and intrigued us with his nightmarish paintings and his unconventional behavior.

Well, you and the Arabs have hardly signed a territorial agreement...

If you are curious to know why Salvador Dali calls himself one of the geniuses of our age, why he says that he can remember his existence before he was born, and if you want to get Salvador Dali's unique views on his religion, his politics, and his surrealist art, we'll go after those stories next week.

But, of course, it is. But in your estimation?

Till then, for Parliament, Mike Wallace. Goodnight.

That involves what... what territory Israel took as result of the forty-eight war.

But Judaism is a religion, sir

Under the terms of an armistice pending final settlement.

Therefore, in your estimation again, to be a good Jew one has to be more than just a religious practicing Jew, one has to enter the religion and the peoplehood at one and the same time to be a fulfilled Jew.

Well now, that's the point that I would like to talk to you, if I may. The fact remains, when we talk about morality... the fact remains that Israel benefited territorially from a war, from armed violence.

Recently David Ben Gurion said, "I still don't believe it's possible to enjoy the full Jewish life outside of Israel."

Well, as a member of the Judaic Faith, which cherishes social justice and morality, do you believe that any country should profit territorially from violence?

When you talk about the huge, sated, fat, Arab States, the eleven sovereign states, it is barely possible that you are guilty of some overstatement, there is also in that area tremendous poverty, tremendous desolation.

Mr. Ambassador, do you.... do you foresee further territorial expansion by Israel?

Of course, there is one political party and a fairly substantial political party within Israel, the Herrad Party, with fifteen seats in your Parliament to the Ben Gurion Party's forty seats. One of the Herrad's major spokesmen, Dr. Joseph Sheckman, wrote this recently, he said, "Zionism is more than Israel, for Zionism Israel's present territory and population are but a partial accomplishment, and the Herrad party is dedicated to territorial expansion." Is that not so?

Let's move along. Recently in the Middle East, I spoke with the President of the National Bank of Egypt, Hussein Fanie, who's a member of the Egyptian Economic Council,

and he told us this, he said "Israel as a nation is doomed to go bankrupt because the resources are pitifully limited: Some olive and orange groves, a little potash, no fuels, no raw materials to speak of, and its industry," he said "Is unable to make enough products to export at a significant profit. Israel can exist only on charity from other nations." What's your answer?

They are impressive facts, but the fact of the matter is that the balance between imports and exports is still way in favor of the imports.

The New York Times...

Surely.

In other words, you are furnishing your house, so to speak.

The New York Times summed up your economic problems at the end of '57 in this fashion: they said, "The trade deficit remained between 300 million and 350 million dollars, which meant that for another year, Israel continued to depend upon the astronomical contributions of world Jewry and particularly United States Jewry to keep her head above water."

We are now faced here, with talk at least and probably the fact, of a recession. Were there to be a serious recession not only here in the United States, but in the world, this could be disastrous for Israel. Could it not?

Talking of America's involvement in all of this because of the Arab-Israeli conflict, the United States finds itself on the horns of a dilemma: We want Israel's survival and friendship, but we also need the friendship of forty million Arabs who might otherwise turn to Russia. Do you think that it is in the United States' best interest, therefore, to befriend Israel and risk thereby losing the entire Middle East to Russia?

You don't believe that friendship for Israel on the one hand, and the Arab States on the other, are necessarily mutually self-canceling?