Page Sixteen
Is Anti-Semitism A
Menace In France?
By
George
Blumberg
(Jewish
Telegraphic
Agency
Correspondent)
Leon Blum, former French
Premier, world famous Socialist
and fighter for justice, who has
resumed his battle for libertarian
causes in France since his liber-
ation from the notorious concen-
tration camp in Germany.
Friday, September 2!, t945
THE JEWISH NEWS
(Copyright, 1945,
Jewish Telegraphic
Agency Inc.).
It's perfectly safe to be a Jew in France nowa-
days. One can walk the streets speaking Yiddish.
Nobody will arrest you, nor torture you. Nobody
will pay much attention. And the law says proper-
ty stolen from the Jews must be restored. But if
one has a claim against a Frenchman, and hasn't
enough money to buy him out, he can't rely on the
police nor on popular support for enforcement of
the restitution laws. That's all.
Jews Too Weak to Get Popular Support
And the Jews are too weak to get popular sup-
port.
They are too weak, not numerically, nor econ-
omically, but internally and morally speaking.
The Jewish community in France is now one
of the largest in Europe. About three fifths of the
Jews of France escaped persecution. And in. spite
of the fact that many are on relief, the community
as a 'whole is not destitute.
One of the leaders of the League Against Anti-
Semitism told me recently that it might be a good
thing if the Jews of France would renounce all their
claims to stolen property or apartments. And when
I told him that such an attitude would certainly
considerably weaken the case of the Jews, he re-
plied that that was the best thing he could think
of to discourage anti-Semitic feeling.
Appeal to American Opinion
The next best thing the anti-Semites can think
of is appealing to American opinion. They pointed
out to me that a large demonstration urging the
French government to curb anti-Semitic activity
should be held in New York at the time of the
visit to America of Gen. de Gaulle.
The French public at large has a certain sense
of justice and would undoubtedly welcome and sup-
port a collective claim made by the Jews for com-
pensation for the property of which they have been
despoiled as a result of Nazi occupation. But the
Jewish community has not had the strength and
vision to evolve and formulate such a collective
claim. And none of the individual claims sounds
convincing enough to carry popular support, with-
out which they cannot be satisfied.
Sometime last winter, one of the Jewish news-
papers of New York announced that 20,000 Jews
were fleeing Paris where anti-Jewish persecution
was raging. Early last month another Paris mes-
sage appeared in a New York Jewish daily an-
nouncing that the disclosure of the Nazi camp atro-
cities had paralyzed anti-Jewish propaganda in this
country. Both statements are equally untrue.
Nobody could organize a pogrom in Paris, and
no amount of anti-Nazi propaganda could induce
anybody here to like the Jews. In a general way,
the French are not - enough interested in the Jews
to start hating them. But winter will come, and
there will again' be no coal and very little food.
Then, the minor anti-Jewish incidents might be-
come somewhat • more dramatic, and the now weary
and indifferent dislike of the Jews might be whip-.
ped up into a more definite feeling.
IMITtrtirrIcnr. trnmnrynrcr
PARIS
NTI-SEMITISM in France isn't
strong. Nothing is strong in this country. But
the trouble is that the Jews here are even weaker
than the anti-Semites.
The little man, the man in the street, has no
great sympathy for the case of the Jew who tries
to recover his property. That same little man may
have, at some time during the occupation, risked
his life and his liberty in order to hide a Jew. But
that was at the time when the Germans were there,
and that was resistance to' the Germans, and then,
the Jew was fighting for dear life.
Now the Jew is fighting for an apartment, or
for some economic advantage or position. That
doesn't raise any national issue, and that isn't con-
sidered by the man in the street as a matter of life
and death. The man in the street has his own
troubles. He hasn't eaten any meat for one or two
months, or can't find any goods to sell in his shop
or his roof leaks. He has shown pity to the Jew
when the Jew was a miserable and hunted down
creature.
The more he is told about the sufferings of
the Jews in the concentration camps, the more he
is inclined to feel that the Jew who has survived
or dodged the concentration camp should be con-
tent with being alive.
Who Isn't Resistant in France Nowadays?
Moreover, the Frenchman who now occupies
the apartment or business the Jew seeks to recover
is always a "resistant." Who isn't a resistant in
France nowadays? Even the police are. There is
no denying that members of the police force in
Paris and in the large cities were active resistants
during the whole occupation. But the greater ma-
jority dutifully fulfilled orders during four years,
even when these orders meant man hunts in the
streets in order to recruit slave labor for Germany.
Then, on the day when the allied armies ar-
rived, they most "resistantly" donned tricolor arm-
bands and started arresting collaborationists.
Energetic police action could certainly sup-
press the anti-Jewish groups in a few days. The
higher police officials are certainly in favor of
such action. But the lower ranks show no great
interest in it.
All this can be seen and heard from the atti-
tudes of people and their conversations near the
scenes of recent incidents. The Jew who tries to
recover his property is never called by his name,
even by his nearest neighbors, but always.ireferred
to as "The Jew". I never heard any word of sym-
pathy for the Jew, even when people express their
dislike for the anti-Jewish trouble-seekers. They
seem to look upon the Jew as one of the trouble
makers, and not as the victim.
`Better' Jews Can Wait—And Do
Now, of course, all this nearer happens in any
of the better residential sections, nor in connection
with any important business. There, everything is
nicely prearranged by well-paid lawyers, and noth-
ing ever happens in the street. The "better" Jews
can wait, and they do. Incidents happen in the
populous sections of Paris, in and around the Jew-
ish quarter where foreign born Jews are more num-
erous, in places where the new tactics recently
adopted by the anti-Jewish groups are most effec-
tive.
They haven't tried, in recent days, to march
through the streets with large signs reading "Down
with the Jews". Now they just stand in groups of
twos and threes and start an animated conversa-
tion. One of them will be an elderly man, wearing
numerous ribbons of World War I, the other one,
let us say, a returned prisoner of war, and the
third just a "resistant" young man. They talk
as loud as possible, till a group of 20 or 30 people
gather around them, and give them an audience for
the following kind of remarks:
"Who talks about starvation in concentration
camps? That Jew was the fattest man I've seen for
years. I didn't see HIM in Buchenwald. Who said
they've all been gassed? I never saw so many of
them on this street. The government's been busy
making laws for the benefit of the Jews—etc. etc."
Then a policeman, or an inspector in plain
clothes, arrives and says "Well gentlemen, I've told
you before not to stand here. Move on". The
whole group disbands and reforms itself on the
other side of the street two minutes later. And the
thing may last one or two hours; during which hun-
dreds of people will have heard no high sounding
theories about racial discrimination, but just "com-
mon horse sense" remarks. I have NEVER heard
any one arguing back.
Dr. Noah. E. Aronstam
Hebrew scholar, that he has writ-
ten a first class book on Spinoza
which soon will be published,
that he has written many hund-
reds of fine immortal poems,
and that in the history of medi-
cine generally and dermatology
in particular, Dr. Aronstam's con-
tributions have been many, great
and invaluable.
Truly Recognized
They. say "A prophet is not
without honor save in his • own
is of
country". How true t1
Dr. Aronstam!
I mentioned the local history
of Detroit, and I did that advis-
edly because
once a great man
is truly recog-
nized, in his on
imediate environs
M y friendship
his w o rldwide
for the good Doc-
recognition i s a
tor has grown
foregone conclu-
through the years,
sion.
and if my respect
and devotion for
How many peo-
him today seems
ple i n Detroit
more secure and
know that Dr.
basic than , it was
Noah Ephraim
in those earl y•
Aronstam has
days of my hec-
been written up
tic youth, it is be-
in Who's Who in
cause we learn to
America for many
appreciate human
years? In look-
values better a s
ing through D r.
we ourselves be-
Aronstam's Who's
come more sober
Who column you
a n d understand-
see that in 1907
DR. NOAH E.
ing through t h e
he did post-grad-
ARONSTAM
school o f hard
uate work at the
Eminent physician, poet
knocks and bitter
University of Ber-
and
author,
whose
verses
experience.
lin, that he had
have appeared in The
been practicing
Jewish News and in
It was only the
medicine • i n De-
newspapers and period-
other day that
t h e
troit since 1898
icals throughout
D r Aronstam,
world.
and that • he was
who was in New
lecturer on der-
York on a visit to
matology and venereal diseases at
his daughter, Theodora, who is
the Michigan College of Medicine
now the wife of a neuropsychiat-
and Surgery in 1905.
rist, Dr. Luis Perelman, made a
He is a member of the Mich-
remark which was almost epig-
igan State and Wayne County
ramatic of the man and his car-
Medical Associations and a mem-
eer.
ber of the American Medical
He said: "I have all my life
Editors Association. In 1916 he
wanted to be a great poet but
was president of the Maimon-
since the fates were against me
ides Medical Society of Detroit
I found it more expedient to earn
of which he was a co-founder.
my living by being a dermatol-
He was a founder of the Detroit
ogist".
Philosophical Society and chair-
Fates Kind to Him
man of the Michigan Spinoza Tri-
Centennial Committee in 1932
Dr. Aronstam little knows
and the author of innumerable
that . the fates were particularly
papers on dermatology and sy-
kind to him in that he turned
philology.
himself out to be a good poet as
well as a good dermatologist. In
Never Younger in Spirit
the years to come, the local his-
Dr. Aronstam, at the age of
tory of Detroit will know Dr.
73 last Feb. 18, despite his pessi-
Aronstam principally as a philo-
mistic growlings which emanate
sopher and an intrepid fighter
from the dark side of his philo-
for right as against things evil.
sophical broodings, is as young
and as virile mentally as he ever
I could relate many dramatic
stories which would show the
was; his poetry is still as sweet
or as pungent as in the days
relentlessness of Dr. Aronstam
when he champions a right
gone by when he was younger
cause and his indomitable per-
in years but never younger in
spirit.
severence in righting a wrong
I propose this toast to Dr. Aron-
one.
starn in anticipation of his 74th
How many people know that
FIRST came to know
Dr. Aronstam 30 odd years ago.
I think it was the early part of
1914—I recollect this date be-
cause the first World War time
had not yet started—when I first
came to Detroit, and through no
fault of . my own found that I
really needed a true friend in-
deed.
It was at this time, without
solicitation, without any hope of
reward from me or anyone else
for that matter, Dr. Aronstam
came instantly to my help.
One never forgets these spon-
taneous acts of friendship—at
least I have that
much faith in hu-
man nature.
Dr. Aronstam is an excellent
birthday, Feb. 18, 1946; Long
A Short Biographical
Sketch By MOSES
BENMOSCHE, M. D.
may you carry on with your
muse at your side, writing poet-
ry to please the heart as well as
the mind, curing people of their
dermatological problems and be-.
ing the good friend to your fel-
low man. And while my glass
is raised and its sparkling con-
tents not yet drained, within
that toast let me include Dr.
Aronstam's everloving, ever de-
voted, ever present, Sarah Aron-.
stam, the dear wife of his heart
who has gone through all his
struggles with him cheerfully,
nobly and truly exemplary, and
his son, Ralph.
V. Jabotinsky's
Novel 'Samson'
Is Reprinted
Vladimir Jabotinsky, the late
Zionist-Revisionist leader, w a s
not only a great orator, linguist
and organizer. He was also a
splendid essayist and novelist.
Under the pen-name ."Alta-
lena" he had written a novel on
the life of Samson. Fifteen years
ago, Horace Liveright published
the novel under the title "Judge
and Fool: The Story of Samson
and Delilah."
A new edition of this fascinat-
ing novel has just been published
under a new title, "Prelude to
Delilah." It was republished by
Bernard Ackerman, Inc., 116 E.
19th St., New York 3, N. Y. The
jacket, illustrated by Arthur
Szyk, repeats the original title
of the novel, "The Story of Sam-
son: Judge and Fool."
* *
It is a great novel of ancient
Israel, of one of our great heroes,
of his carousals and insobriety
which led to his destruction.
Among his own people, Samsoir
failed to smile. With the Philis-
tines, he drank; was hilarious,
joked, and finally became in-
volved with Delilah with whom
he spent seven days and seven
nights.
"Prelude to Delilah" is a story
of a hero's love. It is the story
of Samson who loved and lost
after he had fallen into the sin-
ful error of participating in the
religious orgies of Timnath. The
hero who came from the land of
Dan became a victim of a damsel
of the Philistines.
It is a frank and fearless story,
and a brilliant author wove
thrilling tales around a famous
hero. Humor and pathos pervade
this tale.
Although it is a reprint,—the
new volume having the exact
type and the exact plates of
pages as the book that was pub-
lished 15 years ago under an-
other imprint—it deserves even
now to become a best seller.