EfIBUGO: _ Ui4TLJELYERY
PRIME MINISTER
FOR PRESS 10 MAY 1978_
ZIONIST COUNCIL OF VICTORIA
INDEPENDENCE DAY OF THE STATE OF ISRAEL
It is a very great honour for me to participate in this
celebration of Israel's 30th Independence Day.
It is just over a year ago since I last addressed a part of
Melbourne's Jewish Community at the opening of the Sephardi
Synagogue and Community Centre. On that occasion, I quoted
the following words from Gad. Ben-Meir's invitation. " The
significance of the achievement lies not in * the size or splendour of
the. centre, but in its being an expression of the opportunity
our free country offers its citizens to maintain their age-old
traditions and their religious and cultural individuality".
Much the same can be said of Israel. As a state, it is in fact
small, but it stands in today's world as a beacon of democracy
and freedom and its existence affords its people the opportunity
and freedom to maintain their age-old traditions.
At the time Israel was recreated, the world had just experienced
a war demonstrating the depths of man's capacity for
inhumanity. The crimes against the Jewish people, the crimes
against humanity perpetrated by the monstrous Nazi Regime,
were one element in arousing the nations of the world to accept
the age-old Jewish dream of a return to Zion.
There were other elements. I think of the pioneering work of
those who had been returning to Israel since the end of the
last century, returning not just to die there as had been done so
often in the last two thousand years, but to live there and
make the land live again as it had in biblical times. In the
aftermath of the war many of the surviving European Jews turned
their eyes towards Israel.
Although it was the U. N. which gave international standing to
the Jewish State it was the courage and creativity of its modern
pioneers which brought Israel into being. They made Israel a
nation whose greatest resource is its people and their two
thousand year old dream a dream whose realization we have been
privileged to witness. / 2
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The Jews who emigrated to Israel and those who were born
there are not however . the only ones who have made a
contribution to Israel. Australian Jews, too, have played
their part in building the State of Israel and in providing
it with the material and moral sinews of survival. This
commitment to Israel has in no way qualified the commitment
to Australia.
Australian Jews have found in Australia the freedom from
oppression that is the right of all men and women, regardless
of race,, religion, and culture; they have excelled in all
areas of Australian life.
The Jewish community has been a major force in this society
creating a network of synagogues, schools and welfare
organizations which have contributed to the well-being of our
whole society. You have enriched this country, just as you
have contributed to Israel.
Australian in turn, has not stood by as a spectator in the
momentous events which have shaped the formation and survival of
the' State of Israel. The Australian Government reflecting
the wishes of its people, actively supported Israel's creation.
Since the afternoon of the 14th of May, 1948, when David Ben Gurion
stood in the Tel Aviv Museum and proclaimed the establishment of
the State of Israel, Australia has had a firm commitment to Israel's
right to exist and to enjoy full international rights.
My Government's support for Israel is clear. We have resisted
attempts to exclude Israel from U. N. activities. We have rejected
the repugnant attempts to link Xionism with racism. We will
continue to do so.
Much has happened in this thirtieth year of Israel's existence.
The most momentous event was, of course, President Sadat's
visit to Jerusalem, where he addressed the Knesset and renewed
his pledge that Israel and Egypt should no longer attempt to
settle their differences by war.
In that one visit Israel achieved the implicit recognition of
a major Arab nation. and new and exhilirating prospects of real
and lasting peace.
Australia welcomed President Sadat's courageous initiative
because it represented the first real breakthrough in 30 years
of continual warfare. It opened a new path which Israel has
always wanted but which had hitherto seemed inaccessible; the
path to negotiation. I have said repeatedly that the only
future in the Middle East lies in negotiation.
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The alternative of war has been with us for three decades.
It has solved nothing, it can solve nothing.
In its first thirty years, modern Israel has demonstrated its
courage, its capacity to survive against the odds, to achieve
many things despite the threat of destruction, but the costs
of the constant struggle for survival have been great.
The opportunity is at hand for the threat to be lifted so that
Israel may turn its full energies to even greater achievements.
I wish the State of Israel and the people of the Middle East
a fruitful, and above all, a peaceful future.
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