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
seociation.
Published every Friday by The Jewish News Publishing Co.. 17100 West Seven Mile Road, Detroit, Mich. 48235 .
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Second Class Postage Paid at Detroit. Michigan
PHILIP SLOMOVITZ
Editor and Publisher
CARMI M. SLOMOVITZ
Business Manager
SIDNEY SHMARAK
Advertising Manager
CHARLOTTE DUBIN
City Editor
Sabbath Scriptural Selections
This Sabbath, the twenty-ninth day of Heshvan, 5728, the following scriptural
selections will be read in our synagogues:
Pentateuchal portion, Gen. 25:19-28:9 Prophetical portion, f Samuel 20:18 - 42.
Rosh Hodesh Kislev scriptural reading, Sunday: Num. 28:1-15.
Candle lighting, Friday, Dec. 1, 4:42 p.m.
VOL. LII. No. 11
Page Four
December 1, 1967
Histadrut's Role as Creator of Amity
While peace-aspiring spokesmen for Jews
and Arabs are discussing possibilities of
reaching an accord by way of dialogues, the
Israel Federation of Labor, Histadrut, pur-
sues a policy of enrolling Arabs in Israel's
labor union, in the hope that such cooperative
efforts among workers will be the most ef-
fective means of reducing strife and of es-
tablishing amity.
Within Israel, Histadrut's tasks have, in
the main, met with a great deal of success.
Because their needs are similar and their
aspirations to attain higher economic stand-
ards are alike, Israelis and Arabs have been
able to work together on the common ground
of advancing the needs of the labor ranks.
The fact that Arab workers have been
benefiting from the health service provided
by Histadrut's sick fund, the Kupat Holim,
has been an important factor in such ap-
proaches to unity.
In Jordan, too, there were labor unions,
but a vast difference has been noted in the
sense that Jordan's workers' organizations
are government controlled. A student of
Histadrut's role explained the difference in
this fashion:
Although a movement labeled "trade
unionism" was found to exist in the part
of Jerusalem Jordan had overrun in 1948,
it was a far cry from the free and in-
dependent brand of trade unionism pre-
valent in Israel and elsewhere in the free
world. Jordan had fourteen "trade unions."
These were government-sponsored, govern-
ment-controlled, and, in effect, government-
administered. The country's fourteen un-
ions were nominally autonomous, although
linked loosely with a "national workers as-
sociation." Both the independence and ef-
fectiveness of the unions were fatally
flawed by their subjection to government
control. One example sufficed to give
Histadrut organizers some idea of the na-
ture of the Jordanian "labor movement."
All grievances and disputes regarding
wages, working conditions and fringe bene-
fits were submitted by union representa-
tives to "work supervisors" in the royal
ministry of labor. These government of-
ficials, acting ostensibly on behalf of the
workers, referred the grievances to their
own superviors in the government for ad-
judication, decision and action. Wages
were incomparably lower in East Jeru-
salem than in Jerusalem proper. Union
members had no health insurance or sim-
ilar provisions of any kind, although one
or two unions had concluded agreements
with a private physician and with a few
pharmacies to extend certain discount
privileges.
To Israeli workers, as to all members
of the free world's labor movements, gov-
ernment-controlled unions are on a par
with company unions. After the Six-Day
War Histadrut promptly stepped in to sur-
vey conditions, take ameliorative steps and
plan for the future. For decades, long be-
fore the creation of the State of Israel,
Histadrat had labored strennosnly to organ-
ize Arab workers. Over the years, Histadrut
had made steady progress. Arab Israeli
workers have been educated to the mean-
ing and advantages of modern trade union-
ism. They had learned the usefulness of
labor's best instrument — collective bar-
gaining. Their standard of living is far
beyond the aspirations of workers in the
Arab lands of the Middle East. They are
full-fledged members of Kupat Holim,
Histadrut's Sick Fund, which provides
medical insurance, including hospitaliza-
tion', for all members and their families.
Many had nut traditional skills to excellent
use by forming autonomous cooperatives
with Histadrut help.
Undertaking the task of advancing the
unified program of Israeli-Arab friendship
within the Histadrut ranks, branches of
Histadrut were started in the territory pre-
viously held by Jordan, and the benefits of
Kunat Holim are now being offered to Arabs
in the areas occupies by Israel.
These are factors that speak volumes in
support of Histadrut, in its efforts to enroll
the support of American Jews for the Israel
labor movement. There is no doubt that
Histadrut's contributions towards peaceful
relations are valuable and effective and the
movement has well earned encouragement
and sunrort in its practical and constructive
apnroaches to good relations between the
peoples who are in conflict in the Middle East.
Wayne State University in a Real Dilemma
Wayne State University's administration is
in a real dilemma. Confronted by what is
proudly hailed by deluded youths as "the
New Left," faced with situations under which
any effort at enlightening the uninformed
could well be labeled an attempt at suppress-
ing free speech and a free press. the WSU
authorities appear to be handicapped by a
state of affairs tinder which the university
faces the d'Pger of becoming a nest for anti-
Jewish proragardists and for bigotry.
Already harboring pro-Arab elements who,
in alliance with a group prejudiced by the
race issue, are spreading propaganda that en-
velopes every argument concocted in Cairo
and in Moscow. the new trends in a few WSU
student circles, motivated either by a desire
to help the new "Arab underdog" or to expose
the "Jewish imperialist," are to spread ideas
that stem from misunderstandings.
Thus, a platform given to one of the vilest
advocates of the Council for Judaism anti-
Zionist program—a man who had gone so far
in his fraternal dealings with Nasser that even
the anti-Israel Judaism Council repudiated
him—provided free expression to the spread
of the lie of Jews being not Jews at all but
European converts (an argument steeped in
Arab propaganda that Jews are descendants
of Khazars and are not Jews at all), and the
uncalled-for charge of Jewish aggression,
Zionist political irreligeosity, etc. And the
entire argument is based on an effort to dis-
prove a realism: that the anti-Israel pro-Arab
propaganda of many of the new leftists IS
anti-Semitism whether the apologists for the
New Left like it or not.
It is part of the great pain of the present
age that the revolt of the youth places the
University Establishments in a real quandary.
When deluded extremists copy Streicher-type
cartoons, whether they come from the Krem-
lin or from Cairo, and resort to anti-Jewish
propaganda, when youth yields to the new
cry that victors in a war of defense should
apologize for having resisted threatened
extermination; at a time when under the
guise of freedom of speech and a free press
anything is permitted to go—regardless of
the extent of the untruths and the bias—the
tragedy becomes as great as the revolt itself.
And the WSU Establishment, faced by dilem-
mas that even parents are unable to tackle,
suddenly becomes an accomplice to hatred
and venom/ That's what the New Left activity
has turned out to be at WSU—and the Estab-
lishments, the homes and the administrations,
seem to be able to do so little about it!
Eminent Poetess Honored
Emma Lazarus' Poetry, Prose
Selections in Revised Volume
On the 80th anniversary of the death of Emma Lazarus — Nov. 19,
1967 — the Emma Lazarus Federation of Jewish Women's Clubs
issued an impressive book, "Emma Lazarus — Selections From Her
Poetry and Prose," edited by Morris
U. Schappes.
It is a revised and enlarged edi-
tion of an earlier work, and the
selections amassed in this book in-
clude the best known of Miss Lazarus'
writings, as well as a number of
essays that have not been properly
publicized in the past but which con-
tain valuable views on Jewish sub-
jects — opinions as timely in rela-
tion to Jewish interest today as they
were In the, last century.
Best known for "The Colos-
sus" which is engraved on the
plaque at the base of the Statue
of Liberty, Miss Lazarus corn-
posed many poems that have in-
spired young and old. Schappes'
collection of her verses, which is
evaluated fully in the editor's
introduction, opens with a series
that includes "In the Jewish Syn-
agogue at Newport," "Gifts,"
Ennuis Lazarus
"The Banner of the Jew," "The
Feast of Lights," "Bashi in Prague" and others that have became
indelibly engraved in the poetic works by Jews and about Jena
and Jewish customs and ceremonials.
A major reason given by Schappes why people should read the
works of Emma Lazarus today is: "she can still delight, stir, inspire
and instruct."
Schappes' analyses of Emma Lazarus' poems, his biographical
sketch of the great poetess, his review of her experiences, make his
introductory essay especially valuable in an anniversary volume of this
type.
Miss Lazarus' friendship with Ralph Waldo Emerson is referred
to, and Schappes points out:
"In her youth, Emerson had directed her to the reading of Walt
Whitman, the great poet of her democracy. After her death, Whitman
said to Horace Traubel one day: 'She must have had a great, sweet,
unusual nature.'"
In his preface to the revised and enlarged edition, Schappes
states that he had "taken the opportunity to add two items: the
poem 'The New Ezekiel' and a hitherto uninhibited letter Is
Henry George that I discovered among the Henry George Papers
in the Manuscript Division of the New York Public Library."
In the prose section is Included Miss Lazarus' Was the Earl
Beaconsfield a Representative Jew?," a question she answered in the
affirmative while judging Disraeli as having "possessed talent, rather
than genius." In this section are incorporated Miss Lazarus' essays on
the plight of Russian Jewry, on Heine, a study of Henan and his views
on the Jews, her "Epistle to the Hebrews."
The comments by Henrietta Szold on Emma Lazarus' interest in
the Jews are quoted in an appendix to this interesting book.
Emma Lazarus' great pride in Jewish achievements, her superb
references to Jewish cultural attainments and her emphases on the
spiritual distinguish her writings.
She felt that Israel never lost "its pecular force and virtue" in
spite of the defeat of Bar Kochba, "the ignored despised, defeated
Jewish soldier" of "the last national revolt of the Jews."
In "An Epistle to the Hebrews" she deplored a lack of discipline
among Jews and pleaded for proper organizational unity. How she
would have gloried in the triumphs of Israel's modern Maecabean
heroes !