MIDDLE EAST SITUATION REPORT NUMBER 97 (AS OF 0630 EST)

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: Library of Congress
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): LOC-HAK-544-2-1-4
• Release Decision: RIPLIM
• Original Classification: T
• Document Page Count: 8
• Document Creation Date: January 11, 2017
• Document Release Date: August 16, 2010
• Sequence Number: 1
• Publication Date: November 1, 1973
• Content Type: MEMO

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CENTPJ VINTELLIGENCE AGENCY
1` November 1973
INTELLIGEKCE MEMORANDUM,
iMIDDLE EAST
Situatioft Report Number 97
(as of 0630 EST)
THE MILITARY SITUATION
Navy Review
Completed
State Dept review
completed
GENERAL
(All times citdd in military paragraphs are
Cairo/Tel Aviv timer unless otherwise specified.)
1, No reports of clashes were noted .over night
and calm prevailed on both fronts this morninaa
2. The- Egyptians have complained to the-UN
emergency force that a company-size Israeli paratroop
force was dropped yesterday morning in the Jabal Atagah-?
the hills southwest of Suez City--an area not previously
occupied by the Israelis. No other dotaila are avail-
able on this alleged ' incident. '
PRISONERS OP WAR
3. Syria's Deputy Foreign Minister announced
at a press conference yesterday that Damascus was
MORI/CDF -
C03223775'
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prepared to submit a list of Israeli POWS in Syria to
the interinational Red cross and allow Red Cross of-
ficials to visit them if Israel '.would:
officially state that it will fully comply
with the provisions of the Geneva Conven-
tions;
--return the bodies of Syrians killed in the
war, and allow the return to their homes of
Syrian villagers displaced during the fight-
irig.
6. Mrs. Meir's Labor Alignment was able to carry
the day in a Knesset debate earlier this week over the
POW issue largely because of General Dayan's announce-.
meet of Egypt's readiness to cooperate with the Inter-
national Red cross. In two separate votes, the Israeli.
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parliament rejected a call by opposition leaders for
further plenary debate and approved a proposal, for
turning the POW problem over to committee review.
7. Despite this success, the Labor'party will
face. rough treatanent in the weeks ahead as opposi-
tion leaders sharpen their attacks on the government's
handling of pre-war intelligence and military pre-
pardness, the decision to allow the Egyptian Third
Army to be resupplied, and its capitulation to alleged
US pressures. The US Embassy in Tel Aviv believes
opposition elements will press their temporary ad-
vantage over the Labor party--which is becoming in-
creasingly defensive as it searches for visible po--
litical achievements.
8. US officials believe there has been no basic
.shift in.public opinion in support of. the government's
willingness to enter into negotiations with the Arabs,
but the mood throughout Israel is one of apprehension'
and questioning particularly in regard, to US i.nten,..
tions. On the one hand, the Israelis are deeply
grateful for' the massive US. aid during the critical
stage of the war, but their feelings are confused by
a somewhat fearful recognition that their country,.,,,:
in many respects, almost totally dependent on the ' US .
? Many Israelis are also coming to doubt their long~-
standing belief that US aid to Israel is. a key to
Washington's global and regional interests. The ques-
tion on most Israelis' minds is to, what extent will
Israel be able to determine its own 'future in the
days ahead.
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18. No Soviet naval combatants have entered the
Mediterranean since yesterday morning. "' The bulk of
the Soviet combatant force--at least eleven ships---
remains concentrated south of Crete in the vicinity
of the US aircraft?carridrs Independence, Franklin D..
Roosevelt, and John V. Kennedy.-
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KENYA--1 SRAEL
25. Citing Israel's continued occupation of Arab
lands, Kenya today became the 17th African state to
sever diplomatic relations'with Israel since the start
of the war on 6 October, Twenty-five African states
have now broken diplomatic relations with Israel since
March 1972.
. CHIwA ,
Z6. ? Chinese Premier Chou En-alai, speaking at a
'banquet yesterday for visiting Australian Prime Minister
Whitlam, charged that Washington and Moscow are trying
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to impose on the Arabs a "concocted" scsluti.on to the
Middle East war. According to a, press service re-
port, Chou asserted that the effort was doomed to
eventual failure, even if it may appear to succeed
for a time. The essence of the Middle East issue,
he said, is the superpowers' struggle for hegemony
there.
27. The New China News Agency (NCNA) yesterday
also attacked the Soviets for allowing Jewish emigrants
to leave the Soviet Union and secondarily Washington
for allegedly fundint their resettlement in Israel.
Citing US newspaper reports, NCNA referred to the
unabated high--and even increased--level of Soviet
emigrants to Israel as a "stab in the back of the
Arab people," while Moscow simultaneously professes
"consistent support" for the Arab cause. Moscow's
action, N7A alleged, was motivated by a desire to
curry favor with Washington and to obtain Congres-
sional approval for most-favored nation trade status
for the Soviet Union.
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