
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SUNDAY, November 21, 1993                   TAG: 9311210010
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-12   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Los Angeles Times
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

ISRAEL WINS WORLDWIDE LEGITIMACY

Shunned for decades by most of its immediate neighbors, by the Soviet-led Communist bloc and by many Third World nations, Israel is winning recognition - and praise - around the globe as one country after another bids to open diplomatic relations with it.

"They are granting international legitimacy to Israel in the light of the declaration of principles [on Palestinian self-government] we signed with the Palestine Liberation Organization," said Naomi Chazan, a member of the Israeli Parliament's Foreign Affairs Committee and a specialist on Africa. "We were denied this legitimacy for many years, and getting it is important.

"This should have a positive impact on the peace process because the international community is approving the steps we are taking toward resolving [the Arab-Israeli conflict] and is giving its backing. This also puts pressure on all the parties to make further progress."

Such broad international acceptance is almost overwhelming for Israel, which always had relations with a core of 45 or 50 Western countries but saw even many of them vote against it at the United Nations. For a time, Israel even seemed to be grouped by world opinion among the "pariah states" with which few other countries would deal.

"If the PLO is talking with us, accepts us, why shouldn't everyone else?" a senior Israeli official asked.

By Chazan's count, Israel shortly will have diplomatic relations with about 135 countries, an increase of more than 50 percent in two years. Official delegations now arrive at the rate of three or four a week to discuss trade, cultural, military and other contacts. Top-level visitors, among them prime ministers, presidents and this month King Juan Carlos I and Queen Sofia of Spain, are lined up well into 1994.

by CNB