Purely Commentar, y
Hanuka Theme Marked by By Philip
siomovitz
Crises and Challenges
Hanuka's Lessons and the Challenges to Jewry From All Quarters
Rejoice all you wish in the triumphs of the past, take pride in the Maccabean valor, in the heroic role of the defensive
-tions of our kinsmen in our own time. While we celebrate, we have cause for serious concern.
There are thrn-ts from all sides. Not only the minute State of Israel whose people emulated the acts of the ancient
Maccabees and refused to yield to threats of extermination, but Jews everywhere are confronted with dangers.
Our people were the leaders in the civil rights movement through the years, in the eras when anything akin to battling
for the rights of the downtrodden black men was considered an anomaly in the American society. Yet at this point we face a
Jegro anti-Semitism, and the most rational Negro leaders are in as much of a quandary how to overcome it as we are.
We know that the attacks upon and threats to Israel are being translated into condemnaticins of all Jews everywhere, yet
we often find ourselves weak as an opposition to a new wave of bigotry.
New messiahs have arisen to interpret Judaism and the position of the American Jew for us, but the leadership is so
seriously charged with the duty of fund raising that we have not yet faced properly the issues involving clarification of the
acts.
We know how wrong it is to generalize, yet,the facts are that the intellectuals in our midst are either too busy writing
sex novels or are deluding themselves and all of us with frightful approaches to the Jewish issue.
If Hanuka tef—hes us anything, it is that we need a new tvoe of public relations. an imnroved method of educating the
masses, the need for a stronger civic-protective effort and for proper presentation of facts. We are failing too often, on too
many fronts, and a new Hanuka spirit is needed in our time.
Will a new Maccabean spirit emerge out of the present chaotic state in the areas that surround us and in our own ranks?
If Hanuka teaches us anything at all at this time, it says to us: do not be too complacent!
Yemen's Arabian Tale ... of Struggle With a Kinsman Who Resorts to Poison Gas War and Foils the Red Cross
Dana Adams Schmidt, as the New York Times correspondent in the
Middle East, was in Beirut on Sept. 26, 1962, when an attempt was
made on the life of Imam Mohamed al-Badr, young ruler of Yemen. the
country on the southwestern border of the Aegen peninsula. Schmidt
left for Sana, the capital of Yemen, and there then began a chapter of
great interest in the correspondent's career, resulting also in his writing
a most important record of the Yemen war.
"Yemen—the Unknown War" by Schmidt, published by Holt, Rine-
hart and Winston, is a dramatic story of intrigues, plots to destroy the
Yemenite monarchy and the institution of a republic that was in reality
the vision of Egyptian President Nasser's hope for control of the area.
Also—the event primarily developed in what could be a major benefit
to the Soviet Union.
Schmidt's thorough presentation of the facts, his description of
the pre-medieval kingdom that suddenly emerged into world notice,
his explanation of the position of the Jews of Yemen and of the
early era when there was a "Jewish kingdom" in Yemen, when one
of the rulers adopted Judaism, elevate this book to one of great
significance in the current literature about the Middle East.
It had become evident that during the Six-Day War, Egypt for a
brief period striped attacking Yemen, but very soon thereafter the
attacks were resumed. There is an expose of the Nasser cruelties
imposed upon the Veinenis, and particular emphasis is placed on the
poison gas attacks,
Then Schmidt calls attention to the outlawing of use of gas in war-
fare in the 1918 Treaty of Versailles, and he declares: "In the final
analysis perhaps neither the world's opinion, nor morality, nor law can
determine the course of a conflict such as the one in Yernerr\This is
fundamentally an Arab war, a quarrel between two incompatible Arab
systems. They are ideological systems and power systems. One need only
point to the contrast between King Faisal's (Saudi Arabia) policy of
gradual reform of the traditional system and the relatively revolutionary
character of President Nasser's system; the contrast, also, between the
Egyptian longing for access to the oil wealth of the Middle East and
Saudi Arabia's abhorrence of the Egyptian presence on the Arabian
peninsula. The Yemen war has been fought—and the Yemenis have
been gassed—only partly because of Yemen. More of the struggle has
been due to the rivalry between Egypt and Saudi Arabia. The fact that
the Egyptians used gas is the measure of that rivalry."
It is indicated that Egypt's use of gas was a cause for concern
in Israel during the Six-Day War, when gas masks were provided
to Israel by West Germany. The role of the International Red Cross
is a rather sad one because of delays in exposing the Egyptian
crime.
Thus, we read in Schmidt's account: "On 2 June (1967) the I.R.C.
issued a statement in Geneva saying 'that it was. extremely disturbed
and concerned by the incidents in which gas had been used against
Yemeni villages.' Still it did not mention Egypt, but it was pretty obvi-
ous that only the Egyptians could be responsible. Reporting the Red
Cross mission to Gahar and Gadafa the Red Cross said: 'Delayed by
an air raid, doctors at arrival on the site immediately treated some of
the wounded and collected various indications pointing to the use of
poison gas.' A few weeks later, on 3 July 1967, the American weekly
magazine U. S. News and World Report published two international
Red Cross documents which it had obtained from private sources, which
finally provided official evidence, if such were really still needed, that
gas was being used in Yemen. Although they did not mention Egypt, no
one could doubt that this was the International Red Cross' way of
condemning the Egyptians."
(In view of the suspicions during World War II that the Interna-
tional Red Cross was not prompt in exposing the Nazi crimes against
the Jews, this is additionally significant.)
There are. several references to the Six-Day War and to the
implied suggestion that Arab states failed to act against Nasser
because it might have compromised Egypt's leadership in the
attacks on Israel. Schmidt devotes an entire chapter to a review of
the Jewish position and to the Jewish Kingdom, He discusses the
history of Jews in Yemen, their position of favoritism in the pre-
Christian era and the subsequent intolerance and the persecution of
Jews who were molested, having been relegated to a status of
second class residents.
Of special interest in this chapter is a description of "Operation
Magic Carpet" when nearly all the Jews of Yemen were transported
to Israel.
Schmidt believes there still are a few Jews left in Yemen, but his
analysis tells about the commencement of Yemenite Jewish settlement'
in pre-Israel Palestine, dating back to 1882, "only two years after the
first pioneers ffom Russia," the fact that 35,000 Yemenite Jews were
in Israel in 1948 when the State of Israel was proclaimed, and the sub-
sequent mass exodus. He tells about "a malicious story early in 1948
that six Jews of Sana had been arrested on a charge of having mur-
dered, for ritual purposes, two Arab girls whose bodies they had thrown
into a well. Violence against the Jewish community ensued."
A sad note appended here is about British High Commissioner Sir
Reginald Champion who "attempted to stem the influx" of Yemenite
Jews into Aden in their escape from Yemen. Schmidt reports: "He
(Sir Reginald) asked the Imam Ahmed (the father of Imam Mo-
,
hamed al-Badr), who had succeeded Yahya, to prevent Jews from
leaving Yemen, and that Imam at once decreed that Yemen's Jews
must register themselves and their property. But although be had
a great reputation for cruelty, the Imam Ahmed was willing to allow
the Jews to depart, and, to the dismay of the British, Jews from
more than a thousand communities in large numbers poured into
Sana to pay the head-tax of three Maria Theresa thalers which
would allow them to travel to Aden. In hired trucks, on donkeys
and on foot, the migrating groups made their way through moun-
tains and deserts, paying additional head-taxes to the various
sultanates .and sheikhdoms until they reached the Aden colony
border. Some died of exhaustion and disease on the way, and many
of those who reached the transit camps organized by the American
Jewish Joint Distribution Committee in Aden were sick . . ."
There is this additional item of great interest, recalling the his-
toric exodus, in Schmidt's revealing story about the Yemenite Jews on
their way to Israel from Aden:
"They suffered from malaria, tropical ulcers, trachoma, tubercu-
losis and malnutrition. Their average weight was about 86 pounds. The
DC3s of the Alaska airline and later the CM Skymasters of the Near
East Air Transport Company were able to pack in more than twice the
usual number of passengers. 'Operation Magic Carpet,' which had
begun as a secret airlift during the Arab-Israel war, became an open
exodus during the reign of the Imam Ahmed. From December 1948 to
February 1949, 33,750 Yemeni Jews were flown to Israel and another
15,000 followed in 1950. In the words of the prophecy often quoted by
the Yemenis themselves from Exodus xix.4: 'You have seen what I did
to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles' wings and brought you
to myself.' As they were flown to the Promised Land, it seemed to the
Yemenis that the prophecy had been fulfilled."
Thus, Schmidt traces a history that began with the Jewish com-
munity that settled in Yemen in the time of King Solomon about 1,000
BCE, describing the emergence of -a Jewish Kingdom; the emergence
of the Jewish Tubba Dhu Nuwas, "Lord of the Forelock," who ascended
the Yemeni throne ("The Exiled and the Redeemed" by the late Presi-
dent Itzhak Ben-Zvi is quoted here as authority); and the subsequent
indignities.
It was in 1906 that Imam Yahya issued orders which included
restrictions forbidding Jews to:
Raise their voices in front of Moslems, build higher than houses
of Moslems, touch a Moslem or engage in trades of Moslems, discuss
religion with Moslems, study book outside the synagogue, sound the
ram's horn loudly, etc., etc.
Combining his expose of the Egyptian atrocities and resort to gas
warfare, with descriptions of Yemeni cruelties and the rule of terror
against Jews, "Yemen—the Unknown War" by Dana Adams Schmidt is
one of the significantly revealing documents of our time.
,
•
Potpourri
By NATHAN ZIPRIN
The Power of a Niggan . . .
The story of how a'niggun linked
two long-estranged brothers when
words failed them has recently
been told by President Zalman
Shazar of Israel to a visiting rab-
binic dignitary. The president bad
not seen his brother, Dr. Abraham
Rubashev, since leaving Russia
more than 40 years ago. When
they finally met in Israel, the two
brothers stood facing each other
as if paralyzed by silence. Neither
of them could summon the word
that would open up the expected
flow of intimacy. The strangeness
and the silence lasted but a min-
ute or two, long enough to make
it seem an eternity to the two
brothers. Both had been looking
forward to the meeting with radi-
ant expectancy, but now that they
were together they were sundered
by a strange curtain of silence.
Suddenly President Shazar began
humming a Hassidic niggun he had
heard as a boy in his father's
home, and a smile lit the face of
his brother, who had now joined
him in the singing. Without ex-
changing a word, the two began
chanting other niggunim they
could recollect from their youth-
ful days in Russia. That night, the
I President told his visitor, was
spent in singing and nothing else,
but when dawn arrived it dawned
on the two biothers that the 40
years of their estrangement had
melted under the tunes. Time and
distance were now wiped out and
they could talk again .
Danger Signs .. .
While the eyes of the Jewish
world are centered laigely on the
major Jewish communities in the
world, a number of lesser Jewish
communities in Western Europe
are disintegrating almost to the
vanishing point, succumbing to
assimilation, the lure of cloisters
and an engulfing rate of intermar-
riage. It is generally believed by
students in the field that an inter-
marriage rate in excess of 15 per
cent could represent an irretriev-
able plunge. But in some of the
Jewish communities in those coun-
tries the intermarriage rate is as
high as 60 per cent or more, a
mortal blow to community sur-
vival when it is considered that
there is virtually no trickle of new
Jewish immigrants into those
countries who otherwise could be
counted on in revitalizing those
communities.
$6,864,515 Allocations Announced
Here for Overseas, Nati onal Causes
Overseas and national Jewish
agencies will receive $6,864,515
from the 1968 Allied Jewish Cam-
paign-Israel Emergency Fund in
Detroit.
Allocations to some 30 major
non-local beneficiaries were ap-
proved recently by the board of
governors of the Jewish Welfare
Federation, Hyman Safran, presi-
dent, announced.
Allocations of $3,207,515 were
made from the Allied Jewish
Campaign. The entire Israel •
Emergency Fund which raised
$3,657,000, went to Is r a e 1 's
health, welfare and educational
services through the United
Jewish Appeal.
Allocations for local agencies
totaling $1,724,981 were approved
by the board in June, Safran said.
The largest recipient of the on-
going regular fund is the United
Jewish Appeal, which will get $2,-
822,000. UJA, through such agen-
cies as the Joint Distribution Com-
mittee, ORT, New York Associa-
tion for New Americans, and
United Israel Appeal, supports
programs of development and so-
cial service in Israel plus rescue,
relief, migration, resettlement, re-
habilitation and vocational train-
ing throughout the -world.
Other overseas beneficiaries are
the America-Israel Cultural Foun-
dation, which finances cultural in-
stitutions and programs in Israel,
and the Hebrew University—Tech-
nion Joint Maintainence Appeal,
which supports the Hebrew Univ-
ersity, Jerusalem, and the Israel
Institute of Technology, Haifa,
training grounds for Israel's scho-
lars, professionals and trained
technicians.
Also receiving funds are the
Jewish Telegraphic Agency, the
world-wide news service, and the
United HIAS, which helps Jewish
migrants to find freedom and
security in countries other than
Israel, provides temporary care
and shelter upon arrival, and
assists in the ultimate integration
into local life.
A total of $270,015 was approv-
ed for national distribution. The
health and welfare division,
which includes Bnai Brith Na-
tional Youth Service Appeal,-
National Jewish Welfare Board,
and Council of Jewish Federa-
tions and Welfare Funds dis-
tributed $91,845.
The community' relations divi-
sion allocated .$145,370, to' the
American Jewish Committee, the
American Jewish- Congress,
Defamation League, Jewish Labor
' Committee, Jewish, War . Veteran8,
the Synagogue Council' and Na-
tional Communiti!' Relations Acl-
yisory Board. •
The education ',division,' which al-
located $32,800,: anchides as its
major beneficiaries the, American
Association for ‘.7e4viah :Education,
Dropsie College, RiStadrut Ivrits,
Jewish Publication Society, Na-
tional Foundation for Jewish Cul-
ture, and YIVO-Institute for Jew
ish Research.
• The recommendations for these
allocations approved by the board
of Federation were made by the
1967-68 divisions Under the chalk-
manship of Stanley J. Winkelman,
community relations division; Ma-
dell L. Berman, education di*
sion; and Dr. Peter G. Shifrin,
health and welfare division.
,
THE DETROIT JEWISH HEWS ,
31.7fri4aN_Polcalnher : 1:3r
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