Office of the Historian

Secretary’s Memoranda: Lot 53 D 444

Memorandum of Conversation, by the Secretary of State

secret
[Washington,] July 6, 1950.

Meeting With the President

[Subject:] Item 4. Statements by Government Officials regarding Israel

I discussed this matter with the President, pointing out that it was of course important that whatever statements or speeches were made by Government officials should not be couched in terms of criticism of the Arabs.

I went over with the President the latest examples of this difficulty.1 He will deal with this matter himself.

L[ucius] D. B[attle]

for
D[ean] A[cheson]

  1. The “latest examples of this difficulty” appeared in the New York Times of June 30 which gave an account of a group of messages sent by members of the Cabinet and a score of Senators to the Zionist Organization of America, said to describe Israel generally as a “democratic outpost in the Middle East.”; and in the New York Times account of July 4 of an address to the ZOA the day before by Vice President Barkley, which described Israel as “an oasis of liberty in the desert of despotism”.

    These examples were transmitted to Under Secretary Webb by Mr. Hare in memoranda of July 3 and July 5 (784A.00/7–350./7–550). The earlier memorandum stated that this type of statement (i.e., the statements by Cabinet members and Senators) “has, over a period of time, helped to create in the Arab states an atmosphere of extreme hostility to the United States. The damage which has resulted in our relations with the Arab states was vividly demonstrated during the past week when Egypt, a member of the Security Council of the United Nations, refused to support the UN action regarding Korea. Egyptian officials stated that the anti-US feeling in the Arab states was so strong that it would have been difficult for any Egyptian Government to give its support to a US-backed measure in the UN.” Ambassador Caffery was cited as authority for the statement that “the principal consideration motivating the Egyptian Government in taking this position was the desire to demonstrate in a dramatic way the hostility toward this country which exists in the Arab world as a result of the Palestine situation.”

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