THE JEWISH NEWS
CHALLEN4E FOR 1962
Incorporating the Detroit Jewish Chronicle commencing with issue of July 20, 1951
H EN/NI CIOAL FOR LLJ.AI
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, 1942 at Po st Office, Detroit, Mich. under act of Congress of March
8, 1879.
PHILIP SLOMOVITZ
Editor and Publisher
SIDNEY SHMARAK CARMI M. SLOMOVITZ HARVEY ZUCKERBERG
Advertising Manager
Business Manager
City Editor
Sabbath Scriptural Selections
This Sabbath, the twenty-third day of Tebet, 5722, the following Scriptural selections
will be read in our synagogues:
Pentateuchal portion, Shemot, Exodus 1:1-6:1. Prophetical portion, Isaiah 27:6-28:13;
29:22-23.
,
Licht Benchen, Friday, Dec. 29, 4:51 p.m.
VOL. XL, No. 18
Page Four
December 29, 1961
Is Arab Boycott Noose Fraying?
Economic boycotts resorted to by
Arabs in an attempt to destroy Israel
have been sources of deep concern over
the possibility of establishing the best
international relations through trade
deals and cooperation with foreign na-
tions by industries in this country. The
Arabs have - not ended their threats, and
Israel remains the butt of antagonists in
the United Nations and in many other
spheres where efforts are being made to
establish good relations economically and
politically.
Fortune Magazine was a bit hopeful
recently when, under the heading "The
Frayed Arab Noose," it offered the fol-
lowing analysis of the results of the Arab
boycott:
A growing number of U.S. businessmen are
getting caught in the cross fire of the 13-year-old
war between Israel and the Arab world. The mili-
tary front is quiet, but the Arab states are per-
sisting in their attempt to cripple Israel by
economic blockade. The Arabs not only refuse
to trade with Israel, but they also threaten
economic sanctions against any outsider who does
business with the young nation. Any U.S. firm
dealing with the Israelis is in danger of being
placed on an Arab blacklist and thus cut off
from Arab markets.
A number of. U.S. companies, including Shell
Oil and SocOny Mobil, have closed up their
operations in Israel. But many have defied the
blockade—among them, Emerson Radio, General
Tire & Rubber, Dow Chemical, Fairbanks 'Whit-
ney, and Merritt-Chapman & Scott. These com-
panies have been restricted in one degree or
another in their dealings with many of the Arab
nations, especially the United Arab Republic,
Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Jordan, and Iraq.
The Arabs now blacklist over 300 firms from
all over the world, more than twice as many as
four years ago. The number of U.S. firms on the
list has risen from about twenty in 1957 to nearly
four times that. The lengthening blacklist is
actually an indication that the boycott is nothing
like the tightening noose around Israel that Arab
propagandists claim it to be. In fact, the Israeli
economy is steadily improving, despite Arab ef-
forts to strangle it.
In the early days the blockade was unques-
tionably serious and expensive for Israel, for it
deprived the country of normal sources of oil,
ships, and food. Prior to 1956 and the Sinai
campaign, Israel lived from ship to mouth. De-
prived of access to Middle Eastern oil, the
Israelis hauled crude from such distant sources
as Venezuela and paid a premium of as high as
30 per cent for it. A $45-million exploration and
development program brought in enough Israel
oil to . supply a tenth ,of its own needs. Finally,
the Sinai campaign opened up the Red Sea port
of Eilat, two pipelines were constructed from
there to Haifa, and Israel now buys Persian Gulf
crude at regular rates.
The boycott on shipping forced Israel to build
up rapidly its own merchant fleet from 22,000
tons in 1948 to 4'75,000 tons (1965 goal: '750,000
tons). Similarly, Israel was compelled to develop
agricultural crops that it would not have consid-
ered if it had been free to trade with its neigh-
bors. Today Israel grows 11,000 tons of good-
quality fiber a year, enough for its own needs.
Despite the boycott, Israel's economy has
thrived. Last year each sector of the economy
set new records. But a chief problem continues
to be an unfavorable balance of trade. In 1960,
Israeli imports of goods and services amounted
to $658 million, exports to only $350 million. The
resulting gap is now bridged by U.S. aid, Jewish
philanthropy, and German reparations and resti-
tutions payments. As these diminish, Israel must
produce more for itself and for export.
The key to increased Israeli development is
foreign capital investment. In 1960 alone, the
government approved 440 new foreign invest-
ments. And Israeli authorities estimate that more
than 210 U.S. companies and businessmen now
have stakes in Israeli industry, with a total value
of $150 million. But with still more needed, the
government last year launched' a program to
attract $500 million in new foreign capital.
Here is where the Arab blockade could hurt
badly—if it were effective. But significantly,
more and . more, firms are willing to take the
chance of investing in Israel. In 1960 a number
of U.S. companies began operations in the coun-
try: Sheraton opened a 200-room hotel in Tel
Aviv; Helena Rubinstein started construction of
a cosmetics plant; and Miles Laboratories be-
came the first major investor in the pharmaceu-
tical industry when it announced plans to build
a $1,100,000,000 citric-acid plant in Haifa.
The growing willingness of U.S. and European
investors to ignore Arab threats is, of com•se, due
in part to sympathy with the Israeli cause. How-
ever, this factor is of less importance than the
Arabs would have the world believe. The fact is
that Israel offers economic opportunities which
make it worth while for many types of investors
to ignore Arab threats. (Israel's per capita G.N.P.
—$1,050—is 13 times greater than Egypt's.) In-
dicative of the changed outlook is the attitude
of R. R. Hutchinson, a vice president of Stude-
baker-Packard, which opened an assembly plant
in Haifa in 1960. Said Hutchinson, "We deal
with all the Arab states. But if they choose to
stop their purchases following our agreement
here, that's their affair, not ours."
Moreover, the capricious manner in which the
boycott applied invited defiance. It is '.aot a
"crime" under the blockade regulations simply
to sell goods to Israel, but it is considered
"illegal" to invest in Israel, to set up offices
there, or to enter licensing and technical agree-
ments with Israeli firms. But some U.S. com-
panies, such as Bulova Watch, which do nothing
more than sell their products to Israel, have
found themselves summarily placed on the
blacklist.
Faced with such arbitrariness, formerly hesi-
tant investors have apparently decided that they
might as well be hung for sheep as for lambs.
Furthermore, the chances are good that the
hanging will never come off anyway. A great
many U.S. investors active in Israel have net
been placed on the blacklist; some have been put
on the list and then removed for no apparent
reason. As a spokesman for a U.S. electronics
firm that has been dealing with Arabs and Israelis
alike put it, "The Arabs are a fairly pragmatic
group." A number of companies have ignored
Arab threats, continued dealing with Israel, and
then discovered that they still hadn't lost their
Arab customers. Fairbanks, Morse was blacklisted
last year after it went into partnership with the
Israeli government in order to develop a revolu-
tionary plant to remove salt from water. Despite
this, it has had inquiries about the machinery
from Arab governments.
In its sanguine approach, Fortune
Magazine may have overlooked the fact
that Arab propagandists have increased
their attacks on Israel, that new forces
are constantly being drawn into the bat-
tle against Israel, that Christians who
have been taken to Arab refugee camps
without studying the other side of the
coin and have failed to visit Israel for a
study of the issues involved on the ground
floor have become tools in the hands of
Israel's antagonists in the futile attempt
to destroy Israel.
Anything as hopeful as the Fortune
Magazine analysis is encouraging. But it
must not lull anyone into a state of
complacency. The battle against Israel,
which has become also an attack on all
Jews, must be overcome. Those who visit
the Middle East must be guided toward
an understanding of Israel's position, in
order that the poison that has seeped into
many quarters should not spread over
the entire world body.
At the same time, Israel's kinsmen
must understand that only when Israel is
economically secure will the vitriolic war
come to a complete end. That is why it
is so vital that the Israel Bond drive
should have our fullest support, that our
aid to the United Jewish Appeal, through
the Allied Jewish Campaign, should not
diminish, that we should encourage
Israel's economic development. Through
such assistance, Israel will be given new
hope and renewed strength, and the
world will gain when strife ends in the
Middle East.
0 .11 111V
en 1. 1M
Scholarly Biblical Research
'Jeremiah—Man and Prophet'
Dr. Sheldon H. Blank, professor of Bible at Hebrew Union
College—Jewish Institute of Religion, set out "to discover a
person," and he has fared remarkably well in his "Jeremiah—Man
and Prophet," just issued by University Publishers (239 Park
Ave., S., N.Y. 3).
"No prophet sits for his portrait so well as the Prophet
Jeremiah," Prof. Blank states, as he gives the result of his
research into Biblical and historical records of the man whose
story is found in the Book between Isaiah and Ezekiel—one of
the three longer books of the Prophets—"and its size. entitles
Jeremiah to be known (like Isaiah and Ezekiel) as a 'major'
prophet."
It is because Jeremiah speaks of himself that there is such
an unusual feature in his story. Describing him as associated
with the fall of Jerusalem in 587 BCE and the beginning of
the Babylonian exile, Prof. Blank mentions other of the"writing
prophets" from whom Jeremiah learned. Jeremiah witnessed
the treachery which reduced the remnants of a state entrusted
to Gedaliah as governor, and he "went unwillingly with a fugi-
tive group to Egypt" where he died.
The prophet is viewed by Prof. Blank as deserving honor
"not because he foresees the coming . event --but because he
sees the meaning within the current event." Jeremiah, he
writes, foresaw the 'Babylonian conquest, but his honor "de-
rives from his pained recognition of the fundamental causes
making for his nation's impending collapse. The prophet saw
a pattern in human society (he called it God), according to
Which a rotting social structure, like a condemned building,
must collapse."
Jeremiah's turbulent life, lived in turbulent times, as viewed
in this book, is based on the author's sources, showing "a sensi-
tive prophet's religious experience. It provides an example of
the personal religion of Biblical man. It even throws some light
on the meaning of revelation:"
Reviewing the life of the prophet, Dr. Blank takes his
reader through the labyrinths of a suffering man who, patriot
though he was, even was tried for treason was jailed and
escaped. His defense that God sent him to prophesy warnings
against his people's iniquities fell on misunderstanding ears.
The people permitted him to preach unharmed, but in the 36th
2hapter is told the story of his "book" having been burned on
orders from King Jehoiakim.
Jeremiah appeared in public again. He witnessed the last
days of Jerusalem. He was with Zedekiah, the king whose sight
was taken by Nebuchadnezzar. While Jeremiah admonished his
people, he was not a deserter.
Jeremiah surrendered to God and his "consecration vision"
is utilized for the study of the man's life and works and charac-
ter. In spite of his jeremiads, of his excoriations, he is described
as one who "loved his people." He prayed for his people, "that
people and God become reconciled one to the other. This he
prayed out of love for the people whom at God's command he
was impelled to condemn."
He also prayed for himself. He had no love for his ene-
mies. He "was human" and: "He lacked that form of saintliness
which would have required him to forgive his persecutors.
With fortitude he endured the torment and he did not let
suffering or personal danger deflect him from a course. But
he did not pardon his tormentors. It may be significant and a
clue. to his personality that he could at the same time hate
persons and love people . .
a
Jeremiah also was the prophet who was able "to articulate
most clearly the theme of divine self-pity .. . it was the stress
that the prophet knew in himself, the strain between his love
and God's demand, that aroused him to an awareness of God's
pain . . . It was the conflict within the prophet which, above
all, gave him also his knowledge that he spoke of God."
Jeremiah's prophecies comprise a special section in the book.
The entire analysis by the noted scholar elevate this study to A
high rank of research. Dr. Blank's "Jeremiah" is one of the
significant contributions to Jewish scholarship.
SS