Date

May 11, 1963

Description

With the White House under greater domestic pressure to fashion a Middle Eastern policy that was more “consonant with Israeli desires,” President Kennedy (no doubt with 1964 presidential election in mind) wanted to reach an “accommodation” to those pressures “without seriously impairing our other interests in the area.” In a memo to Secretary of State Dean Rusk, Grant acknowledged that such an accommodation “would be extremely difficult to accomplish,” not least because President Kennedy was concerned about the “arms escalation” in the region, especially the Israeli nuclear program. Consistent with the concern about domestic politics, Grant noted that Deputy Counsel Mayer (Mike) Feldman had a new political role at the White House, as the primary staffer to approve all State Department telegrams concerning Israel and Arab-Israeli issues that had domestic political implications. Grant further mentioned that Kennedy had asked Rusk that the State Department draft a presidential letter to Egypt President, Gamal Abdul Nasser, to initiate dialogue on area security and arms limitations.

Source

RG 59. Subject-Numeric Files, 1963, POL ARAB-ISR

Document published in following posting(s):

The Battle of the Letters, 1963: John F. Kennedy, David Ben-Gurion, Levi Eshkol, and the U.S. Inspections of Dimona

May 2, 2019