World Events in a Month: The Questions of the Middle East Take First Place Among the World's Questions

This corner is edited by: Ziyadeh Awwad

Among the most important events that marked the month of March just past was Israel's withdrawal from the Gaza area and the Gulf of Aqaba, after long give-and-take in the General Assembly of the United Nations. In connection with this withdrawal, Lebanese diplomacy played a great role, whose hero was Dr. Charles Malik, Lebanon's Minister of Foreign Affairs, who put forward the proposal to impose sanctions upon Israel; the bloc of Asian-African states adopted it, and by it the United Nations succeeded in asserting its authority, while the Arabs were able to wrest the initiative from Israel, which was struck to the quick.

In the wake of this withdrawal came the Syrian government's announcement permitting the repair of the oil pipelines passing across its territory, and Egypt's statement permitting the body of international experts in matters of navigation to work on removing the obstacles that stood in the way of resuming navigation in the Suez Canal.

And so only a few days passed before oil was flowing to Banias in Syria and to Tripoli in Lebanon, and light-tonnage ships began to pass through the Suez Canal, in preparation for restoring navigation on a wider scale.

Up to this point it appeared to observers that the problem existing in the Middle East had begun to move along the road to solution, giving promise of preparing a better atmosphere of stability and reassurance. But before long the problem of restoring the Egyptian administration to the Gaza Strip came to the fore: Israel rose up threatening to resume the fighting, and demanding that the General Assembly of the United Nations reconsider its position toward the Egyptian government. The United Nations and the United States of America, however, did not respond to Israel's claims and its threats; they declared that the resolutions adopted by the Security Council and the General Assembly had never presupposed that the Egyptian administration would not return to Gaza. This was a new victory for Arab diplomacy; and Israel fell silent at that point — even if it was not convinced by what had happened.

There came to Egypt first Dr. Ralph Bunche, assistant to the Secretary-General of the United Nations, followed by Mr. Hammarskjöld; the two conferred with the Egyptian authorities and with the general command of the international emergency forces. Israel supposed that the talks of the two United Nations men would impose upon Egypt and the Arab states certain concessions in its favor; but its hopes were soon dashed, for the Cairo talks dealt only with the questions of navigation in Suez and with agreement on a new plan for what would serve as the decisive solution of the problems standing between East and West. Israel was thunderstruck when a spokesman for the United Nations announced that no statement would be issued following the Secretary-General's talks in progress in Cairo.

In the flood of these successive events, and while the atmosphere was being prepared for the Bermuda conference between the American and British chiefs and their aides, Dr. Malik, Lebanon's Foreign Minister, arrived in Beirut, coming from his journey to Egypt, Europe, and America, and then to the United Nations, where he had headed the Lebanese delegation. He handed President Chamoun a personal message from President Eisenhower paying tribute to the efforts of President Chamoun and the present government of Lebanon toward spreading harmony and stability throughout the Arab lands. Dr. Malik then held a historic press conference in which he declared Lebanon's point of view on the pressing international questions, and its positive attitude toward President Eisenhower's plan for the Middle East.

Mr. Richards, the American President's special envoy, was meanwhile discussing the Eisenhower Doctrine with the Lebanese authorities; and before long he announced, in a joint statement with the American government, the agreement of the American and Lebanese points of view on everything concerning the present situation and its need

of a swift and decisive solution.

Here Lebanon takes an honorable stand and exerts efforts deserving of thanks: His Excellency President Chamoun took the initiative of visiting the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, where he met the Saudi monarch and reviewed with His Majesty the most important questions of concern to the Arab countries as a whole. In this His Excellency was — and remains — the first in the race to unify the word of the Arabs for the good and prosperity of their countries, taking hold of nothing but the essence of things and their happy results.

And if we read the visit of the Shah of Iran to Saudi Arabia, and the talks of the Prime Minister of the Sudan in Riyadh and Baghdad and other capitals of the Arab states, together with what Egypt announced in its latest memorandum concerning the conditions for resuming navigation in Suez — and its offer to create a new association of canal users in place of the association formed in London after the conferences of the delegates of the states whose ships use the Egyptian canal — then it may be said that an Arab-Western rapprochement has come nearer to attainment than at any other time.

And just as the month of March inaugurated the first step toward the solution of the existing problems, it also inaugurated the birth of a new state, a member of the United Nations: the state of "Ghana," formerly known as the Gold Coast. And at Bermuda it achieved an American-British agreement in which the two chiefs, Eisenhower and Macmillan, set down the views of America and Britain on everything relating to Europe, the Middle East, the atomic and hydrogen tests, and America's intention to join the permanent military committee of the Baghdad Pact. In this last point there stands out fully America's desire not to retreat, whatever the cost, from the policy of fighting Communism in East and West.