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11. Unequivocal Support for Israel during the Suez Crisis
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217 11 Unequivocal Support for Israel during the Suez Crisis Silver’s involvement in US-Israeli interactions during the Suez Crisis began the day after hostilities broke out, on October 30, 1956, and continued intermittently until Israel’s withdrawal on March 7, 1957. Silver suddenly found himself in a position of senior mediator—the very position that he had so coveted since Israel’s foundation. Yet now, when he could, presumably, have given expression to a separate Zionist agenda, he chose to speak in two voices, neither of which was his own—an admonitory “American voice” in his private talks with Ben-Gurion and Eban and an accusatory “Israeli voice” in his public statements and interactions with the Eisenhower administration. Silver’s sudden ascension to the status of senior “mediator” resulted from the collapse of direct talks between the administration and Israel’s official echelon during the first two days of the war—a communication breakdown that reflected deep anger toward Israel on the part of the White House. When the first reports of Israel’s Sinai incursion reached the president, he was in the middle of an election campaign trip to Florida. This was during the critical eight days prior to the elections, and Eisenhower , who was promising the American people “peace at any price,” felt betrayed and deceived; he raged against what seemed to him an attempt by Israel to interfere in American politics during an election season. If this was indeed Israel’s intention, it quickly proved to be a misguided one. The president cut his campaign trip short, called an emergency meeting that very evening, and announced that he would work to thwart the Israeli aggression even if it meant losing the election. He instructed Dulles to 218 | An Ideological, Political Challenge send a telegram to Ben-Gurion warning that the United States would take all measures, including sanctions, to end the Israeli operation. He even went so far as to quote the American-British-French Tripartite Declaration of May 1950, in which the United States pledged to take action against any side that tried by force to change the borders delineated by the ArabIsraeli armistice agreements. The Declaration’s original intention had been to calm Israeli fears of a possible Arab attack; now the president was threatening to use it against Israel. Eisenhower’s indignation increased the next day when Great Britain and France submitted their fictitious ultimatum to Egypt and Israel; it now became clear to the administration that it had been deceived not only by Israel, but also by its two closest international allies (Alteras 1993, 223–29). During the two-day period of October 30–31, the administration expressed its anger by cutting off its direct channels of communication withIsrael’sofficialdiplomaticcadre.Atthesametime,seniorWhiteHouse and State Department personnel conveyed harsh messages to Israel via a broad range of mediators drawn particularly from the American-Jewish leadership.1 Of the various potential mediators, Silver was unquestionably the most vociferous in his public support of the Israeli position; paradoxically , it was this fact that prompted the administration to view him as the most suitable person to lay the situation before Ben-Gurion in all of its gravity. As Silver noted in his journal, he received a phone call from White House Chief of Staff Adams on the afternoon of October 30, after he himself had issued a public statement supporting Israel and criticizing American policy. Adams explained to Silver that the president was planning to deliver a special radio address the following evening. He asked Silver to telephone the Israeli prime minister and inform him that the president’s speech would directly reflect Ben-Gurion’s degree of willingness to pull Israeli forces back to the armistice lines. In response, Silver sent Adams a draft of the radio speech that the president would, preferably, deliver in exchange for a commitment to 1. Apart from Silver, the administration conveyed harsh messages to Israel via Boustein , Proskauer, Elli Ginzberg, Phillip Ehrlich, and James Zellerbach. [18.191.234.62] Project MUSE (2024-04-17 03:26 GMT) Unequivocal Support for Israel during the Suez Crisis | 219 withdrawal by Ben-Gurion. In this draft there was an implied demand to absolve Israel of any responsibility for the war and to cast off the “friendly neutrality” policy to which the United States had been adhering for nearly four years. Silver wanted Eisenhower to justify Israel’s retaliatory actions and reprimand the Arab countries for having formed a military pact against...