This historic Statement by three of the world's most distinguished Jewish leaders was published on the front page (shown below) of LeMonde on 3 July 1982. 

Dr. Nahum Goldman - founder and past President of both the World Zionist Organization and the World Jewish Congress.

Philip Klutznick - successor to Goldmann as President of the World Jewish Congress, former Secretary of Commerce in Washington, and the only American Jew ever to have been President of both the WJC and B'nai B'rith International.

Pierre Mendes-France - the former President of France who took the French out of the Vietnam war.

At the time the Israelis were marching on Beirut and the leaders of the PLO, including Yasser Arafat, were in a bunker preparing to be captured or killed.  Arafat's immediate response was the lead front page story the next day (also shown below).  Arafat's personal representative and the European leader of the PLO, Dr. Isam Sartawi, gave the Statement the name "The Paris Declaration" and said this would be the Balfour Declaration of the Palestinian People as they struggled to achieve their own independent State.

"The Balfour Declaration for the Palestinian People"

Peace need not be made between friends, but between enemies who have struggled and suffered. Our sense of Jewish history and the moral imperatives of this moment require us to insist that the time is urgent for mutual recognition between Israel and the Palestinian people.

There must be a stop to the sterile debate whereby the Arab world challenges the existence of Israel and Jews challenge the political legitimacy of the Palestinian fight for independence.

The real issue is not whether the Palestinians are entitled to their rights, but how to bring this about while ensuring Israel's security and regional stability.

Ambiguous concepts such as "autonomy" are no longer sufficient, for they too often are used to confuse rather than to clarify.   Needed now is the determination to reach a political accommodation between Israeli and Palestinian nationalisms.

The war in Lebanon must stop. Israel must lift its siege of Beirut in order to facilitate negotiations with the PLO, leading to a political settlement.   Mutual recognition must be vigorously pursued.  And there should be negotiations with the aim of achieving co-existence between the Israeli and Palestinian peoples based on self-determination.



LeMonde FRONT PAGE on 4 July 1982 with Arafat's Reply



LIBERATION (Paris) front-page reporting of the story