Purely Commentary Tragic Loss for World Jewry; Eban Deflates Obstruction; Abortive Eisenhower Proposal By Philip SIOMOVitZ The Charles Jordan-JDC Tragedy is OUR Collective Tragedy Beirut- Hotelmen Want Israel Border Opened to Tourists (Direct JTA Teletype Wire Not since the horrible death of Prof. Israel Friedlaender and Rabbi Bernard Cantor, who were on a mercy mission to The Jewish News) in Poland in 1920, for the Joint American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee, has anything struck us with as much pain LONDON — Leading hotel pro- as the death of Charles H. Jordan. prietors of Beirut have appealed to Charles II. Jordan, as executive vice-chairman of the JDC, personified American Jewry in the philanthropic efforts their government in Lebanon to that we were conducting to rescue the oppressed masses, to rehabilitate those who could be salvaged from the ruins of open the Lebanese-Israeli border, it was reported here Wednesday bigotry-ridden countries. He had dedicated himself to the major movements that aimed to provide succor for the downtrodden. He was a from Beirut. The explanation given for that leader among men, an inspiration to all who sought to assuage grief. Now it is not only his widow who shared with him his dedicated labors, but the entire Jewish people that sits in request is that tourism in Lebanon has suffered great setbacks this mourning over the death of a great son of Israel. year, due to the June war. Friedlaender and Cantor were murdered while on a sacred assignment to aid those who suffered during World The hotelmen reportedly expect War I. that prospects for tourism next Charles H. Jordan played a significant role in aiding the needy during and after World War II and in providing year will be even worse and they may face disaster unless the Israeli havens for the homeless and dispossessed, in Israel and in the free countries of the world. border is opened so that tourists Was it foul play? may come to Beirut over that Is the death of this great man traceable to the enmities against the people in whose behalf the martyred son of our route. people had dedicated his life? A second reason given is polit- We weep for the martyr—and we are saddened that a man of mercy, a servant in the cause of justice, should ical. Influx of tourists via Israel, have fallen as a victim of the hatreds that are dragging this world through inhumanities for which many nations may have it was pointed out in the Beirut dispatch, would obviate reliance to atone for generations to come. * :t * in the Near and Middle East." It is believed that the Soviet plan : on access to Lebanon through offered before his ouster from office by the then USSR Foreign Minister Dmitri T. Shepilov, is still on the record without having been acted upon. There were six points to the Soviet proposals of a decade ago, that: 1. Peace should be preserved on the basis of negotiations; 2. there should be respect for the sovereignty and independence of the countries involved; 3. attempts to draw these countries into military alignments with the participation of the great powers should be re- jected; 4. foreign bases should be liquidated and foreign troops re- moved from the areas involved; 5. general refusal to supply arms; 6. economic assistance without conditions incompatible with the coun- tries' dignity and sovereignty. And now Russia is in such a frightful state of warmongering! All realistic proposals made prior to June 1967 could have led to peace. The situation has been altered. Israel can't be fed on mere promises to attain what the embattled nation already has attained on its own steam during a six-day war. Now it is a question of serious pragmatism: of a recognition by the Arab states that peace is possible only through direct negotiations. If a third party is to be involved it can only be effected by common agreement. The possibility for such a face-to-face seems remote. The one person who could have been the first to make peace—King Hussein— is now the most militant opponent of peace with Israel—except on terms that would restore to him as the defeated monarch, all that he has lost in the June war: and that is certainly a bit too much to expect. Nasser appears to have retained much of his power, in spite of the sufferings he has inflicted on his own people. Iraq has never even had an armistice with Israel. Syria is under USSR domination. Lebanon is divided almost equally in Christian-Moslem ranks. No one dares to be the first to make peace with Israel. What appears to be even a temporary peace is actually a state of war. We con- tinue to hope for another miracle in behalf of Israel's eternity—one that should bring genuine peace to the Middle East cauldron. Search for New Climate in Middle East There is need for a new climate, for an abandonment of previous approaches to the Middle East situation. There are instrusive forces (Tito, Kosygin, their ilk) who would like to dictate peace. But there can be peace only if and when those who have to live together—Arabs and Jews — can speak with each other as neighbors who are deter- mined to remove barriers and to share the available glories of life. Abba Eban, the brilliant spokesman for Israel, explained Israel's desire for a new deal that would assure such neighborliness and would enable refugees to become productive people when he stated, last week: "It is not with the U.S. or the Soviet Union that we have to live but with the Arab States. It is they alone who can unlock the Middle Eastern crisis by a radical and explicit transformation of their policies a..d attitudes. Our neighbors must face the choice of contenting themselves with the cease fire or addressing themselves to Israel in direct and peaceful discourse. The deci- sion to allow the return of refugees from the East to the West Bank is not 'public relations' maneuver but a political act involv- ing the collective responsibility of the government. It arose out of our conviction that the Middle Eastern future cannot be built on a continuing succession of unsolved refugee problems. "Israel cannot solve the whole refugee problem within the cease fire reality. But I do not believe that the Israel public would be satisfied with a 'do nothing' policy, nor does Jewish and world opinion want complete passivity. There might be an effort over an exemplary scale to prove that the conversion of a refugee into a productive citizen is objectively possible. This would be a decisive answer to the controversy of the past (nineteen) years. "The Arab governments which obstructed a solution then are now doing everything possible to prevent Israelis and Arabs from moving towards habits of coexistence. "The new map of Israel and the Middle East must be based not only on new physical dispositions but on a new climate of juridical and emotional relationships." There are not only intruding elements that are aiming to disrupt the chances for peace but also the obstructionists who inject hatred in a climate that could cool and turn into amity. It is under such conditions that Eban and his associates now are compelled to act with greater firmness than ever. * * * The Eisenhower Strauss Middle East Proposal - Many solutions have been proposed to solve the Middle East issue. There have been suggestions that Israel withdraw from presently-held territories so that thereupon the Arabs can be mag- nanimous and offer Israel free passage through Sharm el Sheikh. That's the price offered for Israel's particular withdrawal from the Suez Canal so that the Egyptian waterway may be reopened. Some have gone to even greater extremes—suggesting punishment for Israel for having been the victor and the elevation of the vanquished to the role of dictators of peace terms. These ideas will be mouthed ad nausean as time goes on, unless there is a genuine face-to-face confrontation. Meanwhile there is revival in some quarters of the Eisenhower water-for-peace idea: a suggestion by the former President that joint efforts for water development projects in the Middle East should be sponsored by the United States on a large scale to introduce a vastly improved economic program for Israel and the Arab states, thereby solving the major problem confronting that area: by means of eliminat- ing poverty and assuring stability for all concerned. Admittedly, the Eisenhower Plan was developed by Rear Admiral Lewis L. Strauss (USNR, ret.). There is no doubt that it was made in good faith. The idea has much merit. It would establish atomic desalination plants and would provide the most urgently needed source for power and for human sustenance: water. But the authors of the plan overlooked a basic factor: that the Arabs had already turned down a similar proposal and that obstruc- tionist tactics stood in the way of providing the necessary elements that could have fused Arab-Israel friendships long ago. When President Eisenhower sent Eric Johnson to the Middle East with the plan for harnessing the Jordan River waters, there was general acceptance. When the idea, which was to have been financed at tremendous cost by the United States, was about to be put into operation, the Arab states decided to reject it because cooperation meant recognition of Israel. That's where we stand again today, and anything like a water-for-peace project, regardless of its feasibility, will prove futile as long as Arabs refuse to see realities staring them in the face. There were other developments in the past that might have led to peace. None other than Soviet Russia had suggested on Feb. 11, 1957, that the USSR, together with the U. S., France and Great Bri- tain, enter into a pact jointly to refuse "to supply arms to countries 2—Friday. Auaust 25. 1967 THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS Syria. Weizmann Scientists Probe Life on Moon TEL AVIV (JTA)—Scientists at the Weizmann Institute have de- veloped a technique whereby it may be possible to determine whether there is life on the moon, it was announced here by institute officials. The technique has been worked out in the chemistry department by Dr. Emanuel Gilay. a scientist who had worked in England during World War II with Chaim Weiz- mann. He had been assisted by two other members of his depart- ment, Dr. Benjamin Feibush and Mrs. Rosita Charles Sigler. Under the methods evolved by this scientific team, the identifi- cation of optical isomers in sub- stances obtained from outer space would be possible, indicat- ing whether there is life in the regions where the substance had originated. Dr. Gilav will spend the next academic year at Houston, where he will employ his methods with samples of substances obtained from outer space. ' \line Old City Arabs in Hebrew Univ. Ulpan JERUSALEM — Wasif (4,..tda- mani, a 21-year-old Arab stun lit living in the Old City of Jerusale n and previously a law student at the American University of Beir at, is one of nine Arab students from the formerly Jordanian-held Jeru- salem who have just enrolled at the Hebrew University's intensive Hebrew language course (ulpan) together with about 350 students from abroad. Approximately 100 of the over- seas students are volunteers, most of them from English speaking countries, who, having finished working in Israel, decided not to return to their home countries but instead to study at the Hebrew University. While registering at the ulpan office, Wasif Qadamani informed university officials of his intention to study economics at the Hebrew University and was directed to the faculty of social sciences to ar- range registration. Within five minutes of his first visit to the Hebrew University, the young Arab student had been accepted as an ulpan student — and immediately went to his first Hebrew lesson. Other Arab students from Jeru- salem's Old City who have begun studying at the ulpan include for- mer students at the University of Cairo and at the University of 1 Beirut, as well as one who previ- ously studied at the University of Munich. Their fields of study in- clude medicine, physics, mathe- matics, chemistry and economics. After a preparatory year at the university, they hope to be admit- ted as regular students for the 1968-69 academic year. Fourteen years ago, Arab stu- dents were taught Hebrew in a special course at the Hebrew Uni- 4 versity. During the 1949-53 period, there were special Hebrew classes for Israeli Arabs, but as Hebrew became part of the teaching at Arab high schools in Israel, there was no longer any need for special courses for the university's Israeli Arab students (who this year num- ber approximately 250). More than half of this year's ulpan students are Americans — 182 students who are here under the American Student Program sponsored by the American Friends of the Hebrew University. Other countries represented in the ulpan are: Algeria, Argentina, Australia, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Fin- land, Guatemala, Holland, Hungary, Japan, Mexico, Morocco, Poland, Sweden, Switzerland, South Africa, Tunisia, Uruguary and USSR. Firm U. S. Policy Urged in Report by Congressmen Fa rbstein, Broomfield Special to The Jewish News WASHINGTON, D.C.—Congress- men Leonard Farbstein of New York and William S. Broomfield of Michigan, in a 21-page report pub- lished by the House Committee on Foreign Affairs, presented their impressions during their fact-find- ing mission to Israel and made the following recommendations: "1. To secure a Near East peace settlement which will con- firm Israel's right to live and prosper as an independent na- tion should be the subject of di- rect negotiations between the Arabs and Israelis. 2. The United States should join with other nations in recog- nizing a reunified Jerusalem with supervision of the Holy Places within the City by the various religions orders so that freedom of religious worship in these places will be assured to peoples of all faiths. "3. Part of any peace settle. ment should be an international guarantee of innocent passage through international waterways, including the Straits of Than and the Suez Canal, as an inalienable right of all nations. "4. The United States should be prepared to assist in a just and permanent rehabilitation and settlement of Palestinian Arab refugees. This is essential, and we believe the Israelis, the Arab States, and the rest of the world should share effectively in this endeavor so long overdue. "5. Our government should strive with other nations for agreed limitations on interna- tional arms shipments to the Near East. We should assist in the development of the national economics and the improvement of their standard of living. "6. Our government's diplo- macy In the Near East must be alert, firm, and resourceful to prevent domination of the area by any hostile power." The report of the two Congress- men goes into considerable detail in outlining the current conditions which have developed as a result of the June war. Their statement is filled with many facts and figures, contains a map of Israel and data on the refugees question and the aid given refugees by the United States through the United Nations.