The World - News from May 1, 1987

Senate Minority Leader Bob Dole proposed that Israel serve as the military anchor for the “dangerously soft underbelly” of the NATO alliance. The Kansan, who is seeking the GOP presidential nomination, proposed before the National Jewish Coalition that Washington explore Israel’s willingness to help “fill the big strategic gap” on the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s southern flank. Dole called the Soviet threat in the eastern Mediterranean “ominous” and said that U.S. base rights in Turkey, Greece and Spain “are under direct challenge.”