71. Mr. President, Israel sincerely welcomes your election to the Presidency of this General Assembly. Your elevation to this office does honour to Guatemala and to the entire family of the American Republics. It is also a well-deserved tribute to your eminent personal qualities which have so often been put to the service of the United Nations. You follow in the footsteps of our colleague, Mr. Corneliu Manescu, the Foreign Minister of Romania, who directed our work with high distinction and energy during the last session.
72. The world scene today is remarkable for a multiplicity of grave issues and for the marginal role of the United Nations in their solution. Since we last met, the peace of Europe has been shaken by the Soviet military occupation of Czechoslovakia. The invasion was openly designed to prevent a Member State from freely following a peaceful course in pursuit of its sovereign rights. Thirty years after the political settlement at Munich, we see the darkness fall again upon the Czechoslovak nation.
73. No less ominous than the invasion itself are the reasons adduced in its support, for if these are accepted there is little safety for small nations anywhere. The argument touches the very heart and essence of national sovereignty. Are the nations of eastern Europe truly sovereign? Or must the smaller States in the area be subservient to the interest and will of the region’s leading Power? And does a strong Power have some inherent right to impose its will and interest on smaller States in disregard of their will and their interest? If so, what is left of the Charter principle of the sovereign equality of States?
74. Now the question is heavy with significance in the light of Europe’s tormented history, but its relevance is not confined to Europe alone. It is relevant particularly to the Middle East, where the Power that invaded Czechoslovakia has adopted a one-sided attitude in the political dispute and has at every stage stimulated an arms race. If an issue of such massive scope as that of Czechoslovakia is abandoned by the United Nations after a few days of inconclusive discussion in the Security Council, will not the result
emphasize the constitutional weakness of the international tribunal and its lack of centrality in the life and thought of our age?
75. A similar conclusion flows from the continuation of the war in South-East Asia, on which the United Nations has had no effect. Here, at least, the opening of direct talks has evoked profound relief. In this, as in all other conflicts, there can be no peace without agreement, and no agreement without negotiation. But while the talks go on, the bombs, the shells and bullets reap a deadly harvest. There is no cease-fire; and although there is a wide consensus for de-escalation, this has not yet led to any operative agreements. The need is urgent for the establishment of peace on the basis of the Geneva Agreements, in conditions which would let the peoples of Viet-Nam, South and North, determine their future, free from intimidation or constraint.
76. The absence of such major problems from our agenda illustrates the declining place of the United Nations in modern international life. The main currents of action and discourse amongst nations seem to flow increasingly outside these walls. It is only superficially consoling that one conflict — in the Middle East — is under constant United Nations discussion. For this crisis, too, arises largely from the fact that for twenty years the United Nations was not able to end the Arab war against Israel; and in the early summer of 1967 the Security Council abdicated its function. As the clouds of war gathered and Israel’s peril grew, the highest organ of international security fled from the scene, impotent to act and unwilling to speak. There are few more disquieting documents in modern international history than the record of the Security Council’s proceedings in May-June 1967. It tells small States with lucid clarity that they cannot yet in the present situation count on obtaining their security from here. If threatened with aggression, their choice is often to perish or surrender, or to save their lives in future by their own responsibility and sacrifice.
77. Now this frustration of the Charter vision arises partly from the prolonged discord and contention of the major Powers. There are other causes.
78. A report by the Secretary-General some years ago contained a plea to give greater emphasis “to the United Nations as an instrument for negotiation of settlements as distinct from the mere debate of issues". The plea was vain. Debate, not negotiation, dominates the United Nations practice. Resolutions are often adopted in a rhetorical spirit irrespective of their equity or prospect of fulfilment. These texts often reveal the mathematical accident of membership rather than a balanced verdict. For example, in a dispute between two parties, one of which has a single vote and the other fifteen, the mere assertion of majority power is not likely to be of moral weight. The Security Council has dealt often with the Middle East, but when more than one-third of its Members are States whose diplomatic relations or ethnic and sentimental predilections are entirely on one side, the majority vote loses its moral and political worth.
79. The difficulty can be overcome only by steadily seeking a consensus including the interested States, and by encouraging agreement between the two parties at interest rather than by injunction and enforcement. In short, there should be a diplomatic rather than a parliamentary approach to United Nations activities.
80. The harsh fact is that, except for occasions of special urgency and tension, there is a diminishing public resonance to United Nations activities. The political difficulties of our Organization would be counteracted if it were able to play a more decisive role in the development process. But the Development Decade is now coming to an end in disappointment, with none of its goals attained. Sixteen per cent of the world’s population commands 70 per cent of the world’s resources. Of the movement of wealth from the advanced to the developing countries in 1966, less than 2 per cent came from all the multilateral agencies combined. Of the 80,000 technicians and experts in developing countries during 1960 - 1967, only 3,000 were United Nations representatives in the framework of the United
Nations Development Programme.
81. To such sources of debility we must add procedural weaknesses, such as the excessively long and repetitive agenda of the General Assembly and the tendency to hold massive conferences of which the fruits are not always easily visible. And yet with all this there was never a greater objective need for a unitary framework of international relations than in this age of global history. The United Nations, with all its imperfections, is still the only incarnation of a planetary spirit. It alone involves all States in the adventure of world community. But the gap between the dream and the reality is inordinately wide. The time is ripe for a review conference at which the United Nations will not celebrate its past, but plan its future. The Organization should look at itself, classify its experience, and reform or rationalize its procedures within the text of the present Charter. The twenty-fifth anniversary of its foundation might be due occasion for this exercise in frank and creative self-criticism.
82. The United Nations has been a proud and active witness of African liberation. The admission of Swaziland to our membership brings deep satisfaction to all amongst us who have supported African nations and communities in their pursuit of national independence, human equality and accelerated development of their economies and societies. Toy, the liberty of nations is often peacefully achieved under the benign impact of world opinion. And when a small new State comes into the.light of freedom, it is its flag in the United Nations, above all else, which symbolizes and excites its sense of identity.
83. But the task is not ended. There are still relics of colonialism which must be replaced by independence; and racial discrimination still deprives millions of their birthright of dignity in large areas of Africa. The habit of forcibly segregating and separating peoples on grounds of ethnic and cultural differences began with the Jewish . ghetto system in Europe. My people thus has the longest recollection of the agony to which this principle inevitably leads.
84. Our particular memories have also sharpened our reaction to the cruel suffering now passing over populations and tribes in the eastern regions of the Nigerian Federation. Our Government, Parliament and citizens have been moved not only to make a special effort to bring relief to those who suffer, but also to raise an urgent voice for a solution which will end the bloodshed and famine whose vast dimensions give this problem its universal human context. While African statesmanship seeks an outcome to the political dilemma, the whole world community should co-operate in the relief of human anguish.
85. It is not only on the African continent that human rights are jeopardized. In Eastern Europe we have seen the odious spirit of anti-Semitism evoked to justify repressive policies. In other areas of Eastern Europe Jews still suffer grave disabilities in their cultural and religious self-expression, and in other fields. And in some Arab lands ancient Jewish communities have been victimized in revenge for the failure of the assault upon Israel in 1967, while any international interest in their plight is stubbornly obstructed. They cannot speak; they cannot even bring petition.
86. My Government has decided to give the Members of the United Nations a detailed account of its views on the establishment of a just and lasting peace in the Middle East. Amidst the tumult of a rancorous public debate the deeper motives of our policy have not always been clearly perceived. A structure of peace cannot, of course, be built by speeches at this rostrum. It may, however, be useful for the parties to clarify their intentions and to draw a picture of their policies beyond the routine vocabulary in which this discussion has been held down for sixteen months.
87. In the interest of peace, I shall refrain from detailed comment on the polemical observations made here by Foreign Ministers of Arab States. The total and unblemished self-satisfaction with which they have spoken; the complete absence in their words of any self-criticism or innovation; above all, the lack of detailed and organized comment on concrete issues — all these illustrate the inhibition which still prevents Arab Governments from thinking lucid and constructive thoughts about their relations with Israel. Indeed, yesterday, the Foreign Minister of Sudan actually recommended that Israel simply be dismantled and its people dispersed. Here we have the oldest and most tenacious link in all history between a people and a land, a link which is part of the universal human experience; and yet a Foreign Minister speaks of Israel as though it were a temporary interactional exhibition to be folded up and taken away. Such intellectual frivolity is not heard on any other international issue.
88. Israel cannot easily forget the immense loss and burden which it has borne through the implacable hostility directed against it for twenty years, culminating in the unforgettable summer of 1967. For there has not been any six-day war: there has been a twenty-year war conducted by Arab States in varying degrees of intensity with the candid hope of Israel’s ruin and destruction. The issue is whether this war is now going to be ended by a final peace or merely interrupted in order to be resumed in conditions more propitious for Arab success.
89. Our danger in 1967 was the climax and not the whole story of our predicament. No other people has had to live all its days with a mark of interrogation hanging over its collective and individual survival. Behind Israel’s quest for secure life there is a particular and hideous legacy of wholesale death in the European slaughter-house. In May 1967 we found ourselves beset by deadly peril which we faced in utter solitude of action and responsibility. Maritime blockade, murderous incursions, military encirclement, declarations of overt war, a frenzied torrent of violent threats and a formal announcement by President Nasser that the battle was joined for Israel’s extinction all came together in a cumulative assault on Israel’s life and security.
90. All the acts which fall under the widely supported definitions of aggression were simultaneously concerted against us. The universal conscience was deeply stirred. Millions across the world trembled for Israel’s fate. The memory of those dark days broods over Israel’s life. Our nation still lives intimately with the dangers which then confronted us. We still recall how the imminent extinction of Israel’s statehood and the massacre of its population were seriously discussed across the world: in wild intoxication of spirit in Arab capitals, and with deep impotent sorrow in other lands. To prevent the renewal of those dangers is the first law of our policy. The gravest danger is lest through lassitude of spirit or imprecision of diplomatic craftsmanship or collapse of patience we again revert to fragile, false and ambiguous solutions which carry within them the seed of future wars. Those of us who bear responsibility for our nation’s survival and for our children’s lives cannot have anything to do with vague solutions which fall short of authentic and lasting peace. June 1967 must be the last of the Middle Eastern wars. That resolve has moved our policy at every stage of the political discussion from the outbreak of hostilities to this very day.
91. In June and July 1967 the General Assembly rejected all proposals which sought to condemn Israel’s resistance or to reconstruct the conditions which led to the outbreak of the war. A new stage was reached when the Security Council adopted its unanimous resolution [242(1967)] on 22 November 1967. That resolution was presented to us for our acquiescence not as a substitute for specific agreement but as a list of principles on which the parties could base their agreement. It was drafted, as Ambassador Ball recalled on 11 September, as “a skeleton of principles on which ... peace could be erected". It was not meant to be self-executing. As Lord Caradon said, it was not a call for a temporary truce or a superficial accommodation. It reflected, as he said, a refusal, to be associated with any so-called settlement which was only a continuation of a false truce. Its author stated that any “action to be taken must be within the framework of a permanent peace, and withdrawal must be to secure boundaries". The term “secure and recognized boundaries” had first appeared in a United States draft, the author of which pointed out that this meant something different from old armistice demarcation lines. Secure and recognized boundaries, he said, had never existed in the Middle East. They must, therefore, now be fixed by mutual agreement of the parties in the course of the peace-making process.
92. Those were the understandings on which Israel’s co-operation with Ambassador Jarring’s mission was sought and obtained. Whatever our views might be on these formulations by other Governments, it has been evident at every stage that the two central issues are the establishment of a permanent peace and an agreement for the first time on the delineation of secure and mutually recognized boundaries. These are the conditions prerequisite for any movement. It is here that the peace-making process must begin. If these problems are solved, all the other issues mentioned in the resolution fall into place. To seek a change in the cease-fire dispositions, without the framework of a just and lasting peace and the determination of secure and recognized boundaries, is an irrational course for which there is no international authority or precedent. That would be a short and certain route to renewed war in conditions hostile to Israel’s security and existence.
93. Our contacts with the Special Representative of the Secretary-General began in December 1967. At the end of that month, on 27 December, I conveyed a document to the Egyptian Foreign Minister through Ambassador Jarring, proposing an agenda for a discussion on the establishment of a just and lasting peace. In that communication I expressed a willingness to hear the United Arab Republic’s views and suggested that representatives of our two Governments be brought together informally in order to explore each other’s intentions and to derive assurance and confidence for future contacts. In our letter we made it clear that the establishment of the boundary was fully open - to negotiation and agreement. The United Arab Republic made no reply, offered no comment, presented no counter-proposals. Indeed, from that day to this, the United Arab Republic has not sent us a single document referring to or commenting specifically on any Israeli letters.
94. On 7 January I conveyed to the Jordan Government, through Ambassador Jarring, a letter in which we sought to open a constructive dialogue. That letter reads in part:
“History and geography create an objective affinity of interest between the two countries. More than any other relationship between Middle Eastern States this one involves human interests in a close degree of interdependence. A close and confident association would seem to be as necessary for Jordanian as for Israeli welfare.
“The major problems at issue between Jordan and Israel are closely interconnected. Territorial security, economic and humanitarian problems impinge directly on each other. Moreover, the political and juridical basis of this relationship is of overriding importance. If there is a prior agreement to establish relations of permanent peace, the specific problems at issue between the two countries can be effectively and honourably solved.”
95. I went on to list the five major subjects on which we should seek agreement. These included the establishment of the boundary and security arrangements, which were specifically described as being open to negotiation and agreement. No reply was made to that approach.
96. On 12 February, by the same means, I conveyed the following to the Governments of Egypt and Jordan through the Special Representative of the Secretary-General:
“Israel has co-operated and will co-operate with you in your Mission. We accept the Security Council’s call, in its resolution of 22 November 1967, for the promotion of agreement on the establishment of peace with secure and recognized boundaries.
“Once agreement is reached on a peace settlement, it will be faithfully implemented by Israel.
"As I indicated to you on 1 February 1968, Israel is prepared to negotiate on all matters included in the. Security Council resolution which either side wishes to raise. Our views on the problems cf peace and our interpretation of the resolution were stated by me in the Security Council on 22 November 1967.
“The next step should be to bring the parties together. I refer to the agreement which I expressed to you on 1 February for the Special Representative of the Secretary-General to convene the two Governments.”
97. That message elicited no substantive response. On 19 February I communicated another message to Mr. Jarring for transmission to Cairo. This message assured the Secretary-General’s representative of Israel’s full co-operation in his efforts to promote agreement and to achieve an accepted settlement for the establishment of a just and lasting peace in accordance with his mandate under the Security Council resolution of 22 November 1967.
98. It further pointed that the United Arab Republic is aware of Israel’s willingness to negotiate on all matters included in the Security Council’s resolution. It drew attention to the fact that the resolution is a framework for agreement and that it can be fulfilled only by an exchange of views and proposals leading to bilateral contractual commitments. It accepted the sponsor’s view that the principles recommended for inclusion in the peace settlement are integrally linked and interdependent, and it proposed to move forward to a more substantive stage and to embark on a meaningful negotiation for achieving a just and lasting peace called for by the Security Council.
99. Early in March of this year our reaction was sought to a proposal to convene Israel, the United Arab Republic and Jordan in conferences under Ambassador Jarring’s auspices to seek an agreed settlement in fulfilment of his mandate under the Security Council’s resolution. We accepted this course. We were later informed that the United Arab Republic had rejected and that Jordan had not accepted this course.
100. On 1 May, Ambassador Tekoah was empowered to indicate on Israel’s behalf, in the Security Council, Israel’s acceptance of the 22 November resolution for the promotion of agreement on the establishment of a just and lasting peace. The Israeli representative was authorized to reaffirm that we were willing to seek agreement with each Arab State on ail the matters included in the resolution, and that we accepted the suggestion of Dr. Jarring to bring about meetings between Israel and its neighbours under his auspices in fulfilment of his mandate for the purpose of achieving a peaceful and accepted settlement.
101. On 29 May, after a discussion in our Cabinet, I made a statement in the Knesset proposing a method of implementing the Security Council resolution through negotiation, agreement and the signature and application of treaty engagements to be worked out between the parties. In this, as in previous documents, it was made clear that we regarded the establishment of the boundary as a matter for negotiation and agreement.
102. On 14 June, I was informed that this proposal had been conveyed to the United Arab Republic’s Permanent Representative who had noted it without reaction. At the end of August, I submitted to the United Arab Republic’s Foreign Minister, by the same means, a series of ideas and viewpoints on the implications of the term, “a just and final peace”. This was developed in further communications early in September. To these detailed proposals, the United Arab Republic replied declining direct or specific comment, and limiting itself to a general reference to the text of the Security Council’s resolution. The United Arab Republic would recite the resolution in a declaration of acceptance without any specification to us of how it proposed to reach concrete agreements. In the meantime, Egyptian policy had been authoritatively defined by President Nasser in a formal utterance on 23 June. In that statement, the United Arab Republic’s President expressed willingness to attempt, as in March 1957, “a political solution” on condition that certain principles of Egyptian policy be recognized. He said:
“The following principles of Egyptian policy are immutable: (1) no negotiations with Israel; (2) no peace with Israel; (3) no recognition of Israel; (4) no transactions will be made at the expense of Palestinian territories or the Palestinian people.”
No negotiation, no peace, no recognition, no transactions.
103. How one can build peace out of such negative and immutable principles, how one can build bricks with straw such as this, defeats the imagination.
104. I have taken the General Assembly into the knowledge of our initiatives and proposals. I leave it to my fellow representatives to judge whether their complete rejection was justified or compatible with a sincere attempt to reach agreement on the establishment of peace.
105. In discussing the reason for the lack of substantive progress, we cannot fail to perceive that the discussion of peace has revolved too much around semantic expressions, too little around the solution of contentious issues. There is no instance in history in which a stubborn and complex conflict has ever been brought to an end by the mere recitation of texts without precise agreements on the issues of which the conflict is composed. Israel, as I have said, has accepted the Security Council’s resolution for the establishment of a just and lasting peace and declared its readiness to negotiate agreements on all the principles mentioned therein. We hold that it should be implemented through negotiation, agreement and the joint signature and application of appropriate instruments.
106. When the parties accept a basis for settlement, their least duty is to clarify what they mean by their acceptance. To make identical and laconic statements with diametrically opposed motives and interpretations would come dangerously close to international deceit. All parties must say what they mean; and mean what they say. And the heart of the problem is not only what we say, but what we do. The construction of a peaceful edifice requires sustained action in order to bring the vital interests of the parties into an acceptable harmony. There is no such thing as peace by incantation. Peace cannot be advanced by declarations accompanied by a refusal to negotiate viable agreements. The Security Council’s resolution has too often been used mot as an instrument for peace. It has been invoked as an obstacle or alibi to prevent its attainment.
107. In these conditions my Government has given intensive consideration to the steps that we should now take. Our conclusion is this. Past disappointment should not lead to present despair. The stakes are too high. While the cease-fire agreements offer important security against large-scale hostilities, they do not represent a final state of peace. They must of course be maintained and respected until there is peace. They must be safeguarded against erosion by military assault and murderous incursion. But we should not be content with this. The exploration of a lasting peace should be constant, unremitting, resilient and, above all, sincere. My Government deems the circumstances and atmosphere afforded by our presence here as congenial for a new attempt. We for our part intend to make a new effort in the coming weeks to co-operate with Ambassador Jarring in his task of promoting agreement on the establishment of peace.
108. It is important to break out of the declaratory phase in which the differences of formulation are secondary and in any case legitimate, in order to give tangible effect to the principles whereby peace can be achieved in conformity with the central purposes of the United Nations Charter, with the Security Council’s resolution, and with the norms of international law. Instead of a war of words, we need acts of peace.
109. I come to enumerate the nine principles by which peace can be achieved: First, the establishment of peace. The situation to follow the cease-fire must be one of just and lasting peace, duly negotiated and contractually expressed. Peace is not a mere absence of fighting. it is a positive and clearly defined relationship with far-reaching political, practical and juridical consequences. We propose that the peace settlement be embodied in treaty form. It should lay down the precise conditions of our coexistence, including an agreed map of the secure and recognized boundary. The essence of peace is that it commits both parties to the proposition and the consciousness that their twenty-year old conflict is at a permanent end. Peace is more than what is called “non-belligerency”. The elimination of belligerency is one of several conditions which compose the establishment of a just and lasting peace. If there had previously been peace between the States of our area and temporary hostilities had erupted, it might have been sufficient to terminate belligerency and to return to the status quo ante bellum, to the previously existing peace. But the Arab-Israel area has had no peace. There is nothing normal or legitimate or established to which to return. The peace structure must therefore be built from its foundations. The parties must define affirmatively what their relations shall be, not only what they will have ceased to be. The Security Council too called for the establishment of peace and not for any intermediate or ambiguous or fragmentary arrangement such as that which had exploded in 1967.
110. The second principle refers to secure and recognized boundaries. Within the framework of peace, the cease-fire lines will be replaced by permanent, secure and recognized boundaries between Israel and each of the neighbouring States and the disposition of forces will be carried out in full accordance with the boundaries under the final peace. We are willing to seek agreement with each Arab State on secure and recognized boundaries within the framework of a permanent peace.
111. It is possible to work out a boundary settlement compatible with the security of Israel and with the honour of Arab States. After twenty years, it is time that Middle Eastern States ceased to live in temporary “demarcation lines” without the precision and permanence which can come only from the definitive agreement of the States concerned. The majority of the United Nations have recognized that the only durable and reasonable solutions are agreed solutions serving the common interests of our peoples. The new peace structure in the Middle East, including the secure and recognized boundaries, must be built by Arab and Israeli hands.
112. The third principle: security agreements. In addition to the establishment of agreed territorial boundaries, we should discuss other agreed security arrangements designed to avoid the kind of vulnerable situation which caused a breakdown of the peace in the summer of 1967. The instrument establishing peace should contain a pledge of mutual non-aggression.
113. The fourth principle is the principle of an open frontier. When agreement is reached on the establishment of peace with permanent boundaries, the freedom of movement now existing in the area, especially in the Israel-Jordan sector, should be maintained and developed. It would be incongruous if our peoples were to intermingle in peaceful contacts and commerce only when there is a state of war and cease-fire—and to be separated into ghettos when there is peace. We should emulate the open frontier now developing within communities of States, as in parts of Western Europe. Within this concept we include free port facilities for Jordan on Israel’s Mediterranean coast and mutual access to places of religious and historic associations.
114. The fifth principle concerns navigation. Interference with navigation in the international waterways in the area has been the symbol of the state of war and, more than once, the immediate cause of hostilities. The arrangements for guaranteeing freedom of navigation should be unreserved, precise, concrete and founded on absolute equality of rights and obligations between Israel and other littoral States, and indeed all members of the maritime community.
115. Sixthly, refugees. The problem of displaced populations was caused by war and can be solved by peace. On this problem I propose:
(1) A conference of Middle Eastern States should be convened, together with the Governments contributing to refugee relief and the specialized agencies of the United Nations, in order to chart a five-year plan for the solution of the refugee problem in the framework of a lasting peace and the integration of refugees into productive life. This conference can be called in advance of peace negotiations.
(2) Under the peace settlement, joint refugee integration and rehabilitation commissions should be established by the signatories in order to approve agreed projects for refugee integration in the Middle East, with regional and international aid.
(3) As an interim measure, my Government has decided, in view of the forthcoming winter, to intensify and accelerate action to widen the “uniting of families" scheme, and to process “hardship cases” amongst refugees who had crossed to the East Bank during the June 1967 fighting. Moreover, permits for return which had been granted and not used can be made available to other refugees who meet the same requirements and criteria as the original recipients.
116. The seventh principle refers to Jerusalem. Israel does not seek to exercise unilateral jurisdiction in the Holy Places of Christianity and Islam. We are willing in each case to work out a status to give effect to their universal character. We would like to discuss appropriate agreements with those traditionally concerned. Our policy is that the Christian and Moslem Holy Places should come under the responsibility of those who hold them in reverence.
117. The eighth principle refers to the acknowledgement and recognition of sovereignty, integrity and right to national life. This principle, inherent in the Charter and expressed in the Security Council resolution of November 1967, is of immense importance. It should be fulfilled through specific contractual engagements to be made by the Governments of Israel and of each Arab State, to each Other, by name. It follows logically that Arab Governments will withdraw all the reservations which they have expressed on adhering to international conventions, about the non-applicability of their signatures to their relations with Israel or about the non-existence of Israel itself.
118. Ninth, regional co-operation. The peace discussion should include an examination of a common approach to some of the resources and means of communication in the region, in an effort to lay the foundations of a Middle Eastern community of sovereign States. I expressed some ideas on this subject in an address to the Council of Europe in September 1967.
119. So much for the content of a peace. The process of exploring peace terms should follow normal precedents. There is no case in history in which conflicts have been liquidated or a transition effected from a state of war to a state of peace on the basis of a stubborn refusal by one State to meet another for negotiation. There would be nothing new in the experience of the Middle East or in the relationship of Israel and the Arab States for them to meet officially to effect a transition in their relationships. They have done so before. What is new and unprecedented is President Nasser’s principle of “no negotiation”.
120. But in the meantime we are ready to exchange ideas and clarifications on certain matters of substance, through Ambassador Jarring, with any Arab Government willing to establish a just and lasting peace with Israel. There can be a preliminary stage.
121. I have expounded our views on peace in more detail than is perhaps usual in General Assembly debates. On each of these nine points we have elaborated detailed views and ideas which we would discuss with neighbouring States in a candid exchange of views, in which we should, of course, consider comments and proposals from the other side. No Arab spokesman has yet addressed himself to us in similar detail on the specific and concrete issues involved in peace-making. Behind our proposals lie much thought and planning which will bear fruit when our minds and hearts interact with those of neighbouring States.
122. We ask friendly Governments outside the region to appraise the spirit as well as the content of the ideas which I have here outlined. We urge the Arab Governments to ponder them in a deliberate mood and to explore their detailed implications with us in the normal and appropriate frameworks.
123. The solutions which I have outlined cover all the matters mentioned in the Security Council resolution and would constitute the effective fulfilment of its purpose, which is to inaugurate a new era of just and lasting peace.
124. We base ourselves on the integral and interdependent character of the points at issue. Nothing is less fruitful than an attempt to give separate identity or precedence to any single principle of international policy, thus destroying its over-all delicate balance.
125. Moreover, the obligations of Israel and the Arab States to each other are not exhausted by any single text. They are also governed by the United Nations Charter, by the traditional precepts of international law, by constructive realism, and by the weight of human needs and potentialities.
126. Lest Arab Governments be tempted out of sheer routine to rush into impulsive rejection, let me suggest that tragedy is not what men suffer but what they miss. Time and again these Governments have rejected proposals today — and longed for them tomorrow. The fatal pattern is drawn across the whole period since 1947 — and before. There is nothing unrealistic about a negotiated peace inspired by a sense of innovation and constructed by
prudent and flexible statecraft. Indeed, all other courses are unrealistic. The idea of a solution imposed on the parties by a concert of Powers is perhaps the most unrealistic of all. The positions of the Powers have not moved any closer in the last fifteen months than have the positions of the parties themselves. A close study of how the commitments of certain Powers and maritime States were interpreted in May 1967 does not encourage excessive confidence in this formula. Moreover, and above all, the Middle East is no
longer an international protectorate. It is an area of sovereign States which alone have the duty and responsibility of determining the conditions of their coexistence. When the parties have reached agreement, it would be natural for their agreement to receive international endorsement and support.
127. To the Arab States we say: “For you and us alone the Middle East is not a distant concern, or a strategic interest, or a problem of conflict, but the cherished home in which our cultures were born, in which our nationhood was fashioned and in which we and you and all our posterity must henceforth live together in mutuality of interest and respect.”
128. It may seem ambitious to talk of a peaceful Middle Eastern design at this moment of tension and rancour. But there is such a thing in physics as fusion at high temperatures. In political experience too the very intensity of peril often brings about a thaw in frozen situations. In the long run nations can prosper only by recognizing what their common interest demands. The hour is ripe for the creative adventure of peace.