World Notes ISRAEL

Friends do not always agree, but last week's quarrel between the U.S. and Israel was definitely out of the ordinary. Deputy Secretary of State John Whitehead summoned the Israeli charge d'affaires in Washington to protest Israel's plans to deport 25 more Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza Strip. The State Department publicly expressed "shock" and privately warned Israel that "damage to our bilateral relations will occur" if the deportations go ahead. That apparently means that the U.S. will not defend Israel if the expulsions are condemned in the United Nations.

The U.S. maintains that such deportations are illegal under the 1949 Fourth Geneva Convention, which forbids the transfer of residents from a territory occupied during wartime. Whitehead's rebuke, however, is unlikely to sway Israeli officials, who have already deported 33 alleged troublemakers in what they contend is a legal effort to quell the eight-month-old Palestinian uprising.