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Weizmann Letter to Truman Following Meeting

(May 26, 1948)

New York, May 26, 1948.

Dear Mr. President: Before leaving the shores of the United States, I should like to express to you my warmest thanks for the friendly reception which you accorded me yesterday and for the kind hospitality given to Mrs. Weizmann and myself and to the members of my party at Blair House. This official visit, coming soon after the recognition given to the new State of Israel, will be a source of satisfaction and encouragement to my people.

I trust that the two questions of military assistance, and of financial help for constructive work and for the absorption of Jewish Displaced Persons, will receive urgent and favorable consideration. I shall not go into the details here as these are contained in the aide mémoire which I had the opportunity of leaving with you.

There is, however, one matter to which I only made brief reference and which is of some importance to us. We are anxious that the United States recognition of the State of Israel should be put on a regular basis by an exchange of diplomatic representatives. In anticipation of this arrangement, we have designated Mr. Eliahu Epstein, who is now acting as the representative of the Provisional Government of Israel in this country, as the prospective Minister in Washington. Mr. Epstein, a Palestinian with intimate knowledge of the whole Middle East, has spent the last three years in Washington as the representative of the Jewish Agency for Palestine and has done invaluable work in explaining our aims, problems and activities. I am confident that he will be successful in the new task of increasing the ties between Israel and the United States and of deepening the friendly relations between the two peoples. I hope, Mr. President, that it may be possible for the United States to appoint a Minister to Israel at a very early date.

In taking my leave of you, Mr. President, I should like warmly to commend Mr. Epstein in whom I have every confidence.

Yours very sincerely,

Ch. Weizmann


Source: Foreign Relations of The United States, 1948, The Near East, South Asia, And Africa, Volume V, Part 2, U.S. Department of State, (Washington: DC, Government Printing Office, 1976).