Hebrew U.'s Rededication on Mount Scopus
Carries Special Meaning for Young Detroiter
By CHARLOTTE DUBIN
One year ago, a hostage of the
Arabs stood liberated amid the
rubble of the Six-Day War. Today,
two days after her rededication as
a house of learning, the Hebrew
University on Mount Scopus em-
barks upon her 51st year, slightly
scarred but erect.
There was rejoicing in Israel
Wednesday. But far away, in De-
troit, it was a quiet celebration for
Joe Zias, a Wayne State University
senior who head- r!r!!!!.,.._
ed the 90 - man
corps of volun-
teers that
cleaned up Mount
Scopus after the
Six-Day War.
Zias, 27, is not
a Jew and until
he entered col-
lege he didn't
know any. But
Zias
Israel had a pro-
found effect on him. When he re-
ceives his degree in sociology next
June, he will return to Israel as
a Jew.
Zias had been in Israel for nine
months on the Sherut La'am pro-
gram when the Jewish Agency
called upon him to direct the
clean-up campaign. What had
brought Zias to Israel in the first
place was sheer chance: partly a
desire for adventure, partly curi-
osity about the kibutz movement
he had studied in a sociology class,
Youth
ews
WSU Loan Fund Set Up
by Central Class of '48
Alumni of Central High School's
class of '48 have donated the .pro-
ceeds of their 20th class reunion to
the Wayne State University loan
fund, it was announced by Marvin
Q. Horsvitz, representing the
group.
The sum, $491.78, is to be
loaned to needy and deserving
Central High School graduates at-
tending WSU as part of the re-
volving student loan plan. The
fund will he used for additional
loans as monies are returned by
the borrowers. Both undergradu-
ates and graduates are eligible for
the assistance.
SUN., JULY
28,1968
10:30—Drop by BOOK-O-RAMA,
have free coffee, pick up
free pencils for children
—get birthday card for
Aunt Vee
—look for something dif-
ferent in stationary
—get birthday gift for
5-year-old girl
1:00-1f we can't find enough
to read in out-of-town
papers, go by BOOK-0-
RAMA and find latest
in paperbacks
dinner out with
children, take them into
BOOK-O-RAMA, notice
what they're interested in!
5:00--Have
BOOK,O-RAIVIA
INC.
13645 W. 9 MILE
OAK PARK, MICHIGAN
OPEN SUNDAY 10:30-8:00;
MON. thru SAT. 9:30-9:00
a
partly a hope for free university
credits. He was majoring in busi-
ness at the time.
"I could just as easily have
wound up in Tanganyika," he
said. But the publicity releases
from Sherut La'am, which is
built along the lines of the Peace
Corps, appealed to Zias. He
found more adventure than he
had bargained for.
Zias served as trouble shooter
for the other members of his
Sherut La'am group, and the Jew-
ish Agency came to know him all
too well. His name popped up
when it came time to pick Scopus
volunteers.
Zias, who had been doing irriga-
tion work and picking oranges on
Kibutz Kfar Glickson near Haifa,
took over the administrative end
of the clean-up. But it was a kind
of administrative work he had
never confronted in a business
course.
"One of my biggest problems
was the American kids who had
volunteered after the war out of
some need, hoping for escape
from something. They certainly
weren't representative of Ameri-
can-youth." The Israelis have little
patience with hippies; a country
concerned with the business of
survival needs its young people
to work. And so, the "escapees"
from abroad who had discovered
Israel's one drug, hashish, were
sent home.
The young Detroiter was crit-
ical of the fact that such vol-
unteers had not been screened
out. "After the war, I guess
what we needed was warm
bodies. But some of them were
more trouble than they were
worth."
Once these were gone, a hard
core of volunteers-25 per cent
of them non-Jews, Zias estimates—
set to work at a task that would
have daunted their elders.
Before the long, cold winter set
in, they cleaned the grounds, then
started on Hadassah Hospital and
the university. "The Arabs had
left the area in a bad state. The
buildings, particularly the hos-
pital, had shell holes. There was
a lot of live ammunition lying
about. Oddly, though, the drugs
and medicines remained intact."
A nurse went through the hospital,
removing drugs that could have
fallen into the wrong hands.
"There were four volunteers to
one Israeli. The girls painted and
plastered; the fellows laid bricks
and did carpentry. At first, there
were more girls than guys, but
actually the Scandinavian girls
work like men anyhow."
Zias who stayed in Israel till
his 'job was done in February,
said Israel's famous bureauc-
racy—"more promises than ac-
tion" — was a big stumbling
block to the young volunteers.
They had to work in the cold
without windows, doors or hot
water, until an American—inter-
nationally known H a d a s s a h
leader Charlotte Jacobson — cut
the Jewish Agency red tape.
"I guess that's one thing the
Americans can't get used to; the
Israelis live with it and don't seem
to mind too much."
Despite the hardships and ag-
gravation, "no one left. We had
some American girls who had never
done any work in their lives, but
they learned fast." Of the original
80 in his Sherut La'am group, said
Zias, 30 have remained in Israel.
"And I'd go back today if I could."
When he returns next June,
Zias plans to live in Jerusalem
where he hopefully will engage
in sociological research. His par-
ents are not happy with the de-
cision, but "I'm going back for
good; it's my life." In several
weeks, he will have completed an
eight-month study course toward
conversion to Judaism.
Zias grew up in a town with few
Gottleib Girls Offer Hand THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS
Friday, July 26, 1968 - 13
Gottlieb Chapter, Bnai Brith
Girls, will sponsor a Mitzva Day
Aug. 18. Anyone with odd jobs to
be done may call Helene Rotten-
Jews—Ypsilanti. "I had never met berg, 385-2860.
any, and I thought they were dif-
An elephant, despite its bulk, can
ferent. You know, if you live in
a small town, you form the stereo- pad through the jungle as silently
UNITED BRAND'S•DETPOIT, U. S. A. • 42_ PROOF
type of a Jew by the time you're 8. as a panther.
"But in Israel even before I
spoke Hebrew I felt at home."
"Israel is a country where
0(
people live as men should. There
$
is no superficiality or hypocrisy,
A
no gap between word and deed.
"Any urban industrial society is
II
(Trimmed Rite, Priced Rite)
geared toward the masses not the
individual," he continued. "But
even when Israel becomes more
N
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industrialized, I don't think she'll
change. Here, we speak of the I
WHOLE
0(
land of individual opportunity;
(0
it
there they actually are more con-
C ji
cerned for the individual.
lb 0
"Maybe more and more Ameri- St
ALL SIZES
can youth will seek this in Israel. IN
II
She can't survive without Ameri-
Complete Line of Choicest Meats in Town
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can Jews; they need money over N •
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there, but even more desperately N
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need people.
$
CHICKEN
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TURKEY
.
.
.
Etc.
II
"I truly believe the Jews are the
blocks
`chosen people' if it means they 11
0( 20233 W. 7 MILE
rcr een
orneAri. ICIntEfr:I
2
must be an example of justice to
Mon., Tues. Wed., 8 to 6; Thurs., Fri., Sat., 8 to 9; Sunday, 9 to 6
0
the rest of the world," said Zias.
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