Busting Nasser's In,vincibility Balloon 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, National Editorial Association. Published every Friday by The Jewish News Publishing Co., 17100 West Seven Mile Road, Detroit 35, Mich. VE. 8-9364. Subscription $5 a year, Foreign $6. Entered as second class matter Aug, 6, 1952, at Post Office, Detroit, Mich., under Act of March 3, 1879. PHILIP SLOMOVITZ Editor and Publisher FRANK SIMONS SIDNEY SHMARAK City Editor Advertising Manager - Sabbath Scriptural Selections This Sabbath, the thirteenth day of Kislev,, 5717, the following Scriptural selections will be read in our synagogues: Hosea 11:7-12:12. Pen.tateuchal portion, Vayishlah, Gen. 32:4-36:43. Prophetical portion , Licht Benshen, Friday, Nov. 16, 4:52 p.m. Vol. XXX—No. 11 Page Four November 16, 1956 The Jewish Book: Our Annual Book Fair Among the notable accomplishments of our community's educational agencies are the impressive Annual Book Fairs, ar- rangements for which are made by the Jewish Community Center and scores of cooperating local organizations. In past years, the Book Fairs have drawn large attendances. Noted scholars inspired those attending the book exhibits to enroll as members of the Jewish Publi- cation Society, to purchase books and to enroll in book review seminars. This year, again under the chairman- ship of Dr. Norman. Drachler, the annual Jewish Book Fair will be held Nov. 17 to 19, at the Jewish Center. Again, as in past years, there will be displays of important books, addresses by authorities on Jewish literary subjects and book review semi- nars. The Book Fair serves as the suitable occasion for discussion of the place of the book in the Jewish home and the Jewish community; the value we place on Jewish books and the scholars who produce them. In an essay written as a contribution to a "Reader" issued by Schocken Press, on "The Jewish Book in America," the late Dr. Ludwig Lewisohn. stated: "When we have written or spoken these words: the Jewish book in America, we have touched our deepest wound and have uttered our most anguished aspiration. Never before, our most anguished aspiration. "Two circumstances have brought our nu- merous and powerful American community to this pass—the lateness of its arrival on these shores and the vast centrifugal forces which at once met these immigrants. Work needed to be done and the freedom toward that work existed. Several generations intoxicated them- selves with this freedom toward work and its fruits, toward civic and professional status, toward an almost frenzied enjoyment of that emancipation which, in older and mature com- munities in other lands, was already seen to show fatal cracks and tragic inadequacies. "To this easy and expansive life there were no counterpressures. There was no densitS, of cultural atmosphere in America and no de- mands were made upon the immigrant of any origin. There was little or no linguistic. culture among the older groups, for instance. The frontier tradition that learning was effeminate and that cultural preoccupations discredited the practical man and active citizen persists among the folk masses of America to this day. Hence the immigrant had no encouragement toward either preserving his own tradition of the cre- ative word or of allying himself with another of which—and this is of central import—his children's children might have found their way back to their ancestral one. "Despite these desperate circumstances Jew- Annual Balfour Event In the current trying times for Israel and the Jewish people, it is necessary to recall the names of the men and women, Jews and Christians, whose recognition of the justice of Jewish aspirations in the Holy Land had led them to support the Zionist cause. This year, the name of Arthur' James Balfour, author of the historic Balfour Declaration, was overlooked on Balfour Day, Nov. 2. But Detroit Jewry never forgets him. Lord Balfour's name is memorialized and honored by means of our annual' Balfour Celebration, which this year will take the form of a concert, sponsored by the Zion- ist Organization of Detroit, on Nov. 24, at the Masonic Temple, featuring the world's greatest cellist, Gregor Piatigor- sky. The event itself is significant enough to be honored. It assumes added value by the visit here of the great musician. It is sincerely to be hoped that Detroit Jewry's cooperation in the sponsorship of this cele- bration will assure the raising of a, suf- ficiently large fund to. provide 'for local Zionist needs and for Detroit Zionists' ade- quate share in national ZOA activities, ish books were written in America. A small hard core of Jewish intellectual activity sur- vived the busy founding of organizations and the building of synagogues. Almost precisely twenty-five years ago that old, small core began to vibrate and expand. Jewish writers appeared on the American scene who wrote of a profoundly Jewish consciousness in an Eng- lish both elegant and powerful, and for a few years we seemed to be on the edge of an at least minor rebirth of the creative word among us. But, although that original small group con- tinued to create and although younger men of equal gifts sought to ally themselves with it and despite, above all, those hammer blows of destiny which hurtled down upon, the Jewish people, the creative word was uttered with .ever more cruel difficulty. The books were written; they were not read: "Today — precisely today — another change is on our spiritual horizon. Stirred by the trag- edy of fate, bathed in the radiance that goes out from the Yishuv in Eretz YisraeI, the youngest generation of American Jews is be- ginning to express itself. A bachur from a metropolitan Yeshivah turns out to be an Eng- lish poet of true distinction; boys and girls in an academic Zionist society think and write People have motorcars and electric refrigerators "If American Jewry, despite its power and wealth and material generosity, is not to be- come a withered branch upon the tree of our people's life, an audience for the Jewish book, the Jewish creative word, must be created. people have motorcars and electric refrigerators and smart empty houses—empty of the book and the spirit. Are there men in America, Rabbis and laymen, older and younger -men and women, who know of our great barrenness' and our great need and who must go to this dark people, who must go, if need be, from house to house and from soul to soul—seeing that our way of life is not otherwise communicated among men—with the Jewish book, the Jewish creative word, and persuade these people that they must from time to time cease from their busy multiplication of goods and pleading of causes and even the healing of the sick for the incomparably more needed healing of the soul of American Jewry by its absorption in the past and in the present of the Jewish word, the Jewish book." The ideas embodied are providing ex- cellent material for discussion by partici- pants in Book Fairs and in book review seminars. They offer food - for thought for those who, by their participation in the Annual Jewish Book Month events, show an interest in Jewish cultural projects. On the occasion of the current celebra- tion of Annual Book Month and the Book Fair of our community, we again urge that Jewish book shelves be introduced in all -Jewish homes; that membership enroll- ment in the Jewish Publication Society of America should be one of the major duties of all our people who recognize the im- portance of spreading Jewish knowledge; that the purchase of books should be made a habit to be passed on from generation to generation; that we purchase books as gifts for relatives and friends,- and that we as- sist, by our gifts, in setting up Jewish book shelves in public libraries, in our synagogues and in our schools. The Book Fair has justifiably become one of the outstanding events on our com- munity calendar. Those who have helped advance its significance have earned our gratitude. They have truly contributed nobly to our cultural values. Thanksgiving Thanksgiving occurs in a troubled age this year. We offer thanks that we live in a great land—in a land of plenty and of peace. But our own peace is affected by the conditions that affect the world at large. Can we overcome the war threats? Will the ideals which motivate the craving for peace or the American people reach the hearts of the zest - of mankind? As we prepare to give thanks on Thanksgiving for our bounties, we shall also pray for peace and for amity for all peoples everywhere. Great Ages and Ideas Schwarz's Anthology Spans Time Space in Jewish History , Hadassah is to be congratulated for its encouragement to Leo W. Schwarz, eminent anthologist and author of a number of important Jewish books, and to his publishers, Random House (457 Madison, NY 22), which enabled him to produce "Great Ages and Ideas of the Jewish People." This, too, is an anthology. It covers the Biblical, Hellenistic, Talmudic, European and Modern Ages in Jewish history. The numerous subjects are covered by distinguished scholars: Prof. Yehezkel Kaufman, of the Hebrew University, Jerusalem; Prof. Ralph Marcus, University of Chicago; Gerson D. Cohen, of Columbia University; Dr. Abraham S. Halkin, of New York City College; Dr. Cecil_Roth, of Oxford University, and Dr. Salo W. Haron, of Columbia University. This volume has special value for its realistic apprOach to an undei-standing of Jewish history. The compiler's view is that "knowledge of history is in actuality liberation from the straight jackets of time and ignorance." It is through such an approach, as outlined in Schwarz's introduction, that the reader is able to attain a proper •perspective of the eras outlined in this book. Analyzing the unique features of Jewish history ; Mr. Schwarz states that "no history is simple, and Jewish history in particular is so varied and so complex that it has baffled • even the ablest historians." He then points to two modern writers of universal history, the anti-Jewish Spengler and Toynbee, who, he states, "could not fit this history into their theories and brushed aside quite unhistorically what they regarded as a 'deviation.' " He then proceeds• to show that "one source of puzzlement is the time depth of Jewish history." In the calendar year 5717 in which this is published, he asserts, Jews in the United States celebrate Passover and Hanukah, events that occurred thou- sands of years ago. "Even if you discard the legendary calendar date," he adds, "this book itself encompasses at least 3,500 years . . . Indeed, Dubnow attempted to prove that the Jewish people and their culture are 'coextensive with the whole of history. - While this claim does not hold up under factual scrutiny, it is safe to say that the Jews have an endurance record in the arena of history. The time depth of Jewish history invites one to think not only in terms of decades and generations, but of centuries and milennia." Then Mr. Schwarz deals with the second unique Jewish historical feature, "the geographical span." He comments that the "global dispersion imposes upon the student the huge but exhiliarating obligation of becoming acquainted with world geography throughout the ages." The main interest of the book being more than chronology and geography, the compiler has chosen dates and places "directly related to the origin, growth, and migration of ideas of enduring values." Language elements are seriously considered. Intellectual currents are studied. Indeed, in the pages of "Great Ages and Iddas of the JeWish People" the participating writers have evolved "a cluster of values that are uniquely Jewish and that remain significant for modern men and women. Distinguished scholars have united to evaluate Jewish thoughts and the result is a magnificent work. `The Real Case Against Nasser' With a word, Nasser could have stopped the "anti-Semitic campaign under official Egyptian 'auspices," Edmond Taylor states in a pamphlet, "The Real Case Against Nasser," distributed by Lillie Schultz and George Barnes for Kenmore Associates, 120 E. 56th, N.Y. 22. . shy away The pamphlet declares that "educated Arabs from the mongrel pattern of Nasser's leadership" and that "the fellah and the desert nomad care nothing for Nasser one way or the other." But "to the gutter-barbarians . . . and to the uprooted . . . inferiority-obsessed young Arab intellectuals Nasser . . . has become the perfect, irreproachable, untouchable champion of Arabism against the world."