Conrad Cartoon Sparks Call by Israeli Envoy for Restrictions Against Times Reporter

Eitan Bentsur, the Israeli consul general in Los Angeles, has recommended that Israel withdraw the press credentials of Dan Fisher, the Los Angeles Times bureau chief in Jerusalem, as a reprisal for an editorial cartoon published in that newspaper, Israel Radio reported Friday.

But the broadcast quoted Yossi Beilin, director general of the Israeli Foreign Ministry, as saying that the lifting of the credentials of foreign correspondents was “stupid advice.”

(In Los Angeles, Bentsur said that lifting the credentials of Fisher was one of several options he presented to the Israeli Foreign Ministry, without specifically recommending any. He said he felt, however, that some reaction from his government was required because of the nature of the cartoon, which “I regarded as anti-Semitic and Nazi-like.”

(“I want our outrage and dismay to be appropriately expressed,” he said.)

Bentsur sent a cable listing the options after the publication Wednesday of a drawing by editorial cartoonist Paul Conrad showing an Israeli soldier standing over Palestinian corpses and saying: “I’m willing to talk peace, but there aren’t any Palestinians to talk peace with.”

Fisher said he had received several telephone calls from Israeli officials who complained about Conrad cartoons but assured him that no action would be taken against him because of them.