Letter from Chaim Weizmann to President Harry S. Truman

OFFICE OF THE PRESIDENT P Y Rehovoth, 24th June, 1949 Dear Mr. President, The Government of Israel have communicated to me the text of the Note transmitted to them on your behalf on the 29th May, as well as their reply of June 8th. The matters raised in the Note are of such gravity that I feel impelled to address you personally on the subject. You have throughout taken such a warm and helpful interest in the affairs of our young State that I am most anxiously concerned that you, our great and good friend, should be under no misapprehension regarding our position and in- tentions concerning the issues now at stake. I wish, indeed, it were possible for me to talk matters over personally with you. That is always the best way of removing misunderstanding. We have all been distressed at the slow progress made at Lausanne. It may be that the device of a Conciliation Commission, consisting not of officers of the U.N., but of delegates of three different countries, with different backgrounds and policies, was not the best way of promoting a speedy settlement. It certainly appears. to have been less effective than the mediation of one man pursued in the name of the United Nations as a whole. But be that as it may, we are trying our best to work with this Commission and have submitted to them a number of proposals, to none of which we have so far received any reply from the other side. Indeed up till now the Arab States have altogether refused to sit with our delegates under the auspices of the Commission. When our Delegation first arrived in Lausanne on April 30th, they immediately announced that they had come with full authorisation to negotiate a comprehensive peace settlement with the delegates of the Arab States covering all the matters referred to in the U.N. Resolution of 11th December, 1948. They specifically stated that Israel was ready to contribute towards solving the Arab refugee problem in cooperation with the United Nations and the Arab States. A few days later they submitted to the Commission a draft preamble and two articles of a proposed peace treaty to serve as a basis for discussion. In this draft they proposed, among other things, the final liquidation of the war, the establishment of normal political and economic relations between Israel and the Arab States, mutual guarantees of the frontiers, abstention from the use of force for the settlement of disputes, and international arbitration in case such disputes could not be settled by agreement. To this day we have not received any reply to these basic proposals. Coming to the question of the Arab refugees, our delegation gave repeated assurances to the Commission that Israel was ready to cooperate with the U.N. and the Arab States for a solution of the refugee problem. We pledged ourselves to guarantee the civil rights of all minorities within our territory; we accepted the principle of compensation for land abandoned by Arabs; we declared our readiness to unfreeze Arab accounts in our banks immediately on the conclusion of peace; we set up a Custodian of Absentee Property. Our delegation informed the Commission that the Government of Israel was ready to readmit members of Arab families separated by the war,