U.S. Bows to Arabs in U.N., Israeli Says

Israel’s foreign minister said today the United States showed weakness in catering to Arab desires for a U.N. Security Council resolution condemning Israel, but Iraq dismissed the measure as “meager.”

The resolution, approved in a 15-0 vote of the council Thursday, urges Israel to stop deporting Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza and calls on the United Nations to monitor the security of Palestinians in the region.

U.S. support of the resolution was seen as an effort to preserve an Arab coalition against Iraqi President Saddam Hussein. It was the third time in two months that Washington has failed to exercise its veto power to shield Israel.

Israeli Foreign Minister David Levy said today that the United States has succumbed to Arab pressure.

“There is a weakness among the Americans that is brought about by America’s dependency on the anti-Saddam coalition and by the American obsession that if it is objective and stands by Israel, the coalition is liable to be weakened,” Levy told Israel army radio.

Palestinian and Iraqi officials criticized the wording of the resolution as too weak.

The vote “highlighted the double standards applied by the United States and imposed on the Security Council, which has turned into a tool manipulated by the United States,” Iraqi Foreign Minister Tarik Aziz said.

Palestinian officials complained that the action would not be sufficient to protect residents of the Israeli-held territories because it does not mention the international conference or specify what steps should be taken to safeguard the Palestinians.