r The hart Available hestrument‘ THE JEWISH NEWS Incorporating the Detroit Jewish Chronicle commencing with issue of July 20, 1951 Member American Association of English-Jewish Newspapers, Michigan Press Association.. Published every Friday by The Jewish News Publishing Co., 17100 'West Seven Mile Road, Detroit 35, Mich., VF.,. 8-9384 Subscription S4. a year, foreign •$5. Entered as second class matter Aug. 6, 1042, at Post Office, Detroit, Mich., under Act of March 3, 1879 PHILIP SLOMOVITZ Editor and Publisher VOL. XXV No. 9 SIDNEY SHMARAK Advertising Manager PRANK SIMONS City Editor Page 4 May 7, 1945 • Sabbath Scriptural Selections The Sabbath, the fifth day of Iuar, 5714 — State of Israel Independence Day the following Scriptural selections will, he read in our synagogues: Pentateuchal portion. Lev. 21:1-24:33. • Prophetical portion, Ezekt. 44:15-31. Licht Benshen, Friday, May 7, 7:36 p. m. The Sixth Anniversary of israers Independence The sixth anniversary of Israel's inde- pendence, to be observed by the young state and the Israelis' kinsmen and friends throughout the world this Saturday, the fifth day of Iyar, finds us in a dismally somber state. The Israelis are threatened with war, by neighbors who outnumber them 30 to It in areas 300 to 1 the size of the Jew- ish state. At the same time, world Jewry is faced with many problems, relating to Is- rael, which challenge the strength of our characters and the extent of the courage with which we must face- libelous accusa- tions and the spread of venom which often indicates the. danger of war between the Contending peoples. in the Middle East. Peace in that area would bring prosperi- ty 5 to Arabs . as well as Jews. It would mean an end to CornmuniSt machinations aimed at capturing the area for the Soviet Union in its struggle against the West. It would re- duce the fears for a world conflict. But sel- fish politicians stand in the way of such amity. They are bent upon arousing hatreds, undoubtedly for selfish economic reasons — because they desire to perpetuate the serf- dom of the Arab masses and to retain feudal domination over them — and out of a de- termination to dominate politically in their countries. It is in such an atmosphere that Israel now finds herself. It is against many evil forces that Jewry must act in defense of the young state. And because the situation is so serious, the challenge is all the greater— not only to Jewry but to the Christian friends of Israel whose valiant help has been a contributing factor in the Jewish state's triumphs against the vast odds that were piled up against her. . Israel's successes are, indeed, remarkable. In . spite of war threats, defying all obstacles, handicapped by the entrance of hundreds of thousands of new settlers f rom differing climes who speak many languages and are unaccustomed to the new conditions, Israel has Succeeded in integrating the multitude of new arrivals into a unified society and is gradually melting them into a strong nation. The economy of the young state has been threatened by scores of reverses; yet Israel has overcome most of them and her many new industries attest to a courageous stand against all obstacles. Those who have as yet failed to be cap- tivated by the spirit which has created Is- rael and has kept the young state humming with activity must learn to know that the reborn nation began With 600,000 Jewish inhabitants and now has a popUlation of more than 1,500,000 — half of them sur- vivors from the curse of Nazism. This is in itself a very great accomplishment. But it is not the only one; There are 200,000 new housing units in Israel, 80,000 of them being permanent dwellings. There are projects for the development of industries to utilize the rich deposits of glass sand, copper, iron, phos- phates. There is a vast afforestation pro- gram. Thanks to the help provided by the United Jewish Appeal — the major bene- ficiary of the Detroit Allied Jewish Cam- paign — the newcomers have been inte- grated within Israel's economy and spiritual life. - With the help of the Israel Bonds, many hundreds of new enterprises have been es- tablished in the Jewish state, electric power consumption has increased from 200,000,000 KWH to 800,000,000 and Israel ships now carry nearly 500,000 tons of freight. Investments have increased from 121,- 000,000 Israel pounds in 1948 to 650,000,000 IL in 1953. Exports have risen from 1,500,- 000 Israel pounds in 1948 to 2,500,000 in 1953. These are symbols of growth. They are the evidence that is needed to prove Israel's progress. But we must ever' keep in view the real- ity of the existing situation — that Israel is under constant attack and must have the help of her friends throughout the world, especially the American people. - American Jewry has a special obliga- tion, which must be reaffirmed on the sixth anniversary of Israel's independence. We must uphold the hands of the builders of Zion. We must protect those \Who have fled the Nazi holocaust and now must dig • deep into Israel's soil . so that they may never again be uprooted. We must redouble our efforts in behalf of the funds which help Israel's immigrants —through the Allied Jewish Campaign. We must continue to encourage the Is- rael bond drive, in order that investments may grow so that Israel may become self- supporting. Above all, we must exert our efforts in demolishing the frightful libels leveled against Israel. We must join in presenting the truth, in order that America's friendship for Israel may not be impaired. Let us rededicate ourselves to these tasks on Israel's sixth anniversary. Then our greetings to the young state will have real substance. Spread of Prejudice Through Comic Books A New York psychiatrist, Dr. Frederic Wertham, describing how comic books hamper the progress toward easing tensions among races, declared, in an address to the Urban League in New York, that "through comic books more racial prejudice, espe- cially against Negroes, has been taught to American children' than at any time in the previous 100 years." Dr. Wertham declared: "In all comic books people are divided into two groups. They are either long-limbed, mus- cular • supermen or an infinite variety of sub- humans—foreign-born, Negro, Oriental, in a never-ending stream of prejudice-producing images. "Children don't have to be badly adjusted to absorb the racial prejudice given to them as entertainment. No one has a psychological need for race prejudice. If you don't teach it to them, they just don't get it." This is reminiscent of the work of Julius Streicher, the Nazi terrorist whose hate-in- spiring program in his ghastly Stuermer may have been responsible for more mur-' ders of Jews than.: any other. Hitlerian. in- strument. The stories and pictures -circulat- ed by this demented Nazi • did exactly . th6 damage described by Dr. Werthant. with the additional tragic fact that the venom was spread among adults as - Weli - aS- Chil- dren, creating an overall German antipathy to JeWs. It is evident that there is need to in- fluence the creators of the comic books --- 7 the authors of the ,stories, the artists and the publishers along lines of common decency. If this can be -accomplished with- out censorship, a basic ideal will have been defended most adequately. Round Table in New Home A Hillel Book by Ludwig Lewisohn 'What Is This Jewish Heritage?' A Review by MAURICE SAMUEL Hillel did well in going to Ludwig Lewisohn for the first of its Little Books series—the program book, one may perhaps call it. it is quite extraordinary how Lewisohn, after thirty years of think- ing and writing on Jewish matters can bring to a re-statement of basic principle a freshness and glow which one instinctively associates with a gifted spirit which has only just seen the light, This lies partly in his style, which combines with lucidity of ex- pression a vast, musical range of allusiveness; and partly in the depth of his feeling, which, again, combines the special utterance with the universal purpose. Here in less than fifty pages you find a series of definitions: "What is a Jew," "The Choice," "Tradition and its Meaning," "The Heritage," 'The Classical Foundation." It is a pity that there is not a proper antonym to definition," which means delimitation, identification by exclusion; for these definitions are also their own opposites—they are the expansion of the significance of Jewish thought and of the Jewish role in man's history. Thus, no sooner has he made clear what a Jew is not (e.g., neither "an accident," nor a stereotype of secular concepts) than he proceeds to indicate that being a Jew is the fundamental datum The of a Jew's existence, hence his only all-human possibility. choice, then, is not between a Jew and something else, but between being a Jew and being nothing. This is the limit of a Jew's choice. And the fateful decision is related to the universal problem of man in the twentieth century, who can choose to be an individual, or surrender to the anonymity of the mob. But at once Lewisohn warns against that frivolous interpre- tation of "individuality" which is in reality the evasive negation practiced by the feeble-willed and justified by the feeble-witted: individuality without tradition. And having established tradition as the very material of individuality he applies it, with a rapid glance over the Jewish scene, to the specific content of the Jewish heritage. Here, of course, he does no more than indicate what many other books in this series will have to develop in detail; and if Hillel can follow up this first publication with others on the same level, and moved by the same power, it will have performed an important task. As a friend of Hillel, I should like to utter warning. Better slowly and to good effect. • The Emergence of the American Jewish Community History of Rochester Jewry Rabbi Stuart E. Rosenberg's "The Jewish Community of Rochester (N.Y.) 1843-1925," published by Columbia University Press. (2960 Broadway, NY27), is more than a history. It is a study of the development of Jewish communal life in this country and it is, as Prof. Salo Baron states in his foreword, an "epic description" of an American Jewish community. Rabbi Rosenberg outlines the rise of Rochester Jewry from the handful of first immigrants, and the various changes that took place from the time of the settlement of the German Jews, the immigration of the Polish Jews and the gradual fusing of the various elements into a single, wholesome community. Dr. Baron refers to this development as "the saga of successive waves of immigrants who settled on these shores; their speedy adjustment and, before long, significant contributions to the eco- nomic life of their city; and the constant interplay of 'old' and `new' in their life and outlook." Dr. Rosenberg describes the economic changes in the corn- munity, the establishment of industries, the cultural and social aspects of Rochester Jewry. The entire • portrait emerges in sharp focus as a masterful emergence of an element in American democracy. Not unlike experiences in other communities, the story of Rochester Jewry shows how East Europeans and German JewS first conflicted then formed a unified community. The Mortara Case in 1858 and the formation of the Alliance Israelite Universelle in France in that year spurred. Rochester Jewry on to unified and cooperative action. The part played by philanthropy and social welfare, charity drives and Zionism, and especially the synagogue, are ably des- cribed.in this impressive book. Rabbi Rosenberg considers Roches ter Jewry, as of the year 1925—up to which point he wrote his. history—as being "still an adolescent community." But he points to "newLfOund powers" and a turning of Rochester. Jews to theit own resources, since they can no longer .augment their forces with. Acquisition by the Detroit Round Table of Christians and Jews of a new home, in the Kirby . Medical Building at 81 E. Kirby, represents another advance in the' efforts of the inter-faith good-will movement to strengthen amity in our community. In the new Round Table home, there will be better facilities for meetings of dis- cussion groups and leaders who are active here. in, behalf of. the National Conference of Christians and Jews. There will be op - . portunities for Detroiters to study the needs fir better .relations and to make use of the splendid library on human relations. immigrants,: • We join in • the hope that a strongei,.. This ,history is worth reading and.stwlying;. in. this Tercenten.A.s: Round Table will mean.an.increasingly more ary year, as an inspiration to other communities to produce their.: effective brotherhood, rooted in fact and histories of Jews who have..developed.ne.spiritual centers in this, ,country. reality and not Mere lip . service.