THE JEWISH NEWS ROYAL FEAST Incorporating The Detroit Jewish Chronicle commencing with issue of July 20, 1951 Member American Association of english-Jewish Newspapers, Michigan Press Association, National editorial Assoet- ation Published every Friday by The Jewish News Publishing Co., 17515 W. Nine Mile, Suite 865, Southfield, Mich. 48075. Second-Class Postage Paid at Southfield, Michigan and Additional Mailing Offices. Subscription $8 a year. Foreign $9 PHILIP SLOMOVITZ Editor end Publisher CARMI M. SLOMOVITZ Business Manager CHARLOTTE DUBIN City Editor DREW LIEBERWITZ Advertising Manager 14 4,:TERROR/$7. 0 Sabbath Scriptural Selections This Sabbath—Sabbath Nahamu—the 16th day of Av, 5731, the following scriptural selections will be read in our synagogues: Pentateuchal portion, Deut. 3:23-7:11. Prophetical portion, Isaiah 40:1-26. Candle lighting, Friday, Aug. 6, 7:27 p.m. VOL. LIX. No. 21 Page Four August 6, 1971 Positive Approaches to Jewish Solidarity Serious concern in Reform Jewish ranks over the dangers of increasing assimilationist tendencies in Jewish ranks has resulted in the resolution that was proposed at the recent convention of the Central Conference of American Rabbis, by its retiring president, Rabbi Roland Gittelsohn, that "mixed mar- riages are contrary to the tradition of the Jewish religion," and the proposal called upon members of the Reform rabbinate "not to officiate at such mixed marriage ceremo- nies." An interesting observation has been made upon this new trend in Reform attitudes by Rabbi Marc Tanenbaum of the American Jewish Committee, who called attention to the earlier Reform position which only "dis- couraged" participation in mixed marriage ceremonies. Rabbi Tanenbaum joined in the warnings against dangers stemming from intermarriages by stating, in part: "What has led to this more stringent proposal against mixed marriages? For one thing, the rate of mixed marriages during the past 25 years has increased astronomically. The April 1971 journal of the Reform rabbis disclosed that in Los Angeles 40 per cent of the 1,000 weddings where a Reform rabbi was the celebrant were mixed marriages. Most of these marriages were performed by a few rabbis who set no standards, that is, they did not require—as do other Reform rabbis—that the non-Jewish person must agree to study Judaism, to establish a Jewish home linked in some way to the Jewish community and to raise their chil- dren as Jews. That failure, as Rabbi Gittelsohn told his colleagues, risks divorcing the Reform movement of Judaism from k'lal Yisrael, and will certainly weaken the Reform struggle for accept- ance in the state of Israel as a legitimate Jewish religious alternative to Orthodoxy. "The participation of Reform Jews in the strug- gle for the religious and cultural survival of Russian Jewry undoubtedly must intensify the paradox. How can one justify a demand to allow Soviet Jews to perpetuate their religious con- tinuity, when mixed marriages here are resulting in 70 per cent of the children being lost to the Jewish community?" Such declarations serve to discourage in- difference to the existing problem. Positive assertions now are made in efforts to offset impending dangers. Los Angeles is not alone in the experience alluded to by Rabbi Tanen- baum. Every large Jewish community now is faced with the problem of a segment of the rabbinate yielding to what those who offi- ciate at mixed marriages consider a need in trying to retain some of those intermarrying within Jewish ranks. Rabbi Tanenbaum's reference to the Russian attitudes applies not only to mixed marriages but also to Jewish cultural prob- lems. Apologists for the USSR have chided American Jews who ask for cultural rights for the Jews in the USSR, with the taunts that in Western countries, too, there is a lessened interest in Yiddish and other Jewish matters. The Russians have pointed out cor- rectly that Yiddish has declined here, but they consistently fail to acknowledge the truth that, while Jewish cultural rights are denied under Russian government regula- tions, any comparable declines result only from the free actions of a community in which the basic rights to Jewish observances are never denied but are the result of trends resulting from the freedoms in our society for people to practice or not to practice their inherited rights. Primarily, therefore, the problem in our own ranks is that of assimilation and or in- difference. It is this lack of interest which the concerned rabbis seek to deflate. The emphasis now given on one aspect of assimi- lationism—that which may be condoned by intermarriage and the failure to assure con- versions which could contribute toward a solution of this serious problem—indicates an approach to a challenge with firmness. More positive action in all spheres of Jewish activities, the cultural and the family loy- alties, the knowledgeable interest in Jewish affairs, commitment to our legacies, under- standing of our role in human society are basic to the obligations we have as Jews in the task of retaining the solidarity that is vital to survival. Oil as an Issue of New USSR Puzzlement New Times of Moscow introduced a sur- prising note into the issue affecting Russian animosity to Israel and the USSR's pro-Arab position. The English-language Soviet peri- odical suggested the "unique possibility of Israel's loosening her alleged dependence upon the United States." The suggestion was embodied primarily in this statement: "Foi. the United States, in the final analysis, stands only for the restoration and strengthening of the position of American imperialism in the Middle East, for the rich oil and important strategic considerations, and least of all does the United States care about the fate of the Israeli people. But Israel must live among the Arab states by herself and alone." The New York Times Moscow correspond- ent, in his cabled report on this new approach to the Middle East situation by a Soviet periodical, commented: "In some ways, the suggestion to Israel that her ties with the United States should be questioned resembled American efforts to reduce Arab dependence on the Soviet Union." There is no doubt about the uniqueness of this new attitude. The fact is that support- ers of Israel's right to survive attacks from the Arab states have kept warning that oil interests are responsible for much that has happened to affect the Israeli position. The Jewish state must have defensive means to withstand possible attacks by Arab armies, and it has developed that only the United States has been providing some such means. The feeling is that insufficient aid has been given Israel, because of the hesitancy with which the U.S. State Department acts to assure peace in the Middle East. It is no longer necessary to emphasize that peace in that area can be assured only if Israel cari prevent a war by retaining strength to resist attacks. So—whatever Israel does, in retaining a traditional friendship with the U.S., is based on a desire for international friendships. The Soviet Union could very well be a partner in such aims, and the commencement of reborn Jewish independence was effectively linked with such a friendship. Resumption of Israel- USSR diplomatic relations and a reduction in the armaments race that has been stimu- lated by the Kremlin could contribute toward the desired peaceful relationships which could lead also to an Arab-Israel peace. Introduction of the oil issue by a Soviet organ adds to the puzzlement in Soviet relations. Assuming that the question of oil is an international problem, as has been indicated in Arab pressures upon Western needs, the issue could be divorced from the conflict between Israel and the Arabs toward which Russia contributes a major share of guilt. 1 1 111111i (11 1 CrA llow- Gilboa's 'Black Years of Soviet Jewry' Exposes Kremlin Hatreds Yehoshua A. Gilboa, native of Poland who has settled in Israel where he edits El Maariv of Tel Aviv, author of "Confess, Confess," a volume in which he described his eight-year prison experience in Soviet camps, provides an important history of Russian Jewry during the periods of sufferings and oppressions in "The Black Years of Soviet Jewry," published by Little, Brown and Co. In a translation from the Hebrew by Yosef Schachter and Dov Ben-Abba of Boston and Toronto, this authoritative work outlines the happenings in the crucial years of 1939 to 1953 and gives a full account of the restrictions, the emergence of Stalin's anti-Semitism, the posi- tions held by Jews and the attitudes of Jewish assimilationists who in some measure collaborated with Communists in creating obstructions for Jewish traditional adherences. If it were only for the description of the eminent Jewish personalities in the era under description, this volume would at once assume a very notable position at a time when a knowledge about Russian Jewry is so vital. The very title of the book, denoting the "black years," emphasizes• the hatred for Jews. Stalin's venom is especially indicated: The authot, points out: • "Stalin did not have to wait until his old age, when there were no limits to his power in the country and when his hate of the Jews became more open and brutal, to make a calculated use of anti-Semitism for his own interests. Even during the 1920s, when the Old Guard, as much as it had been trained to sanctify,-. : means for the sake of the end, could still find it seriously immoral or unaesthetic. to utilize anti-Semitism for political purposes, Stalin was resorting to premedi- tated anti-Semitism. After having taken advantage of the collaboration of two Jews (Zinoviev and Kamenev who in 1922-23 had together with Stalin constituted • a faction called the 'triumvirate') in maneuvers to prevent a third Jew (Trotsky) from becoming Lenin's successor, he made use of anti-Semitic tricks in hi,s, struggle against his two former partners when the time came. lie saw to:A2 that during the appearances of the Party's official propagandists, the distinctrki--- - between Trotskyites and followers of Zinoviev was obliterated and a hint given to the rank and file of the members that it was no accident that the leadkrs' of the two opposition groups were Jews. At Stalin's inspiration, propagandists made an effort to plant the notion that a struggle was going on in the. Party -. between native Russian socialism and aliens seeking to pervert it." . , Because of current developments and the revival of " Z ionist interests in Russia among Jews who are protesting against governi4' ment discriminations and the Kremlin's anti-Israel policies, Gilboa's analyses of the anti-Zionist attitudes among early Jewish Com- munists is most interesting. He reviews the activities of the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee of the Soviet Union, the travels t the United States in behalf of this JAC effort of Itsik Feffer and Solomon Mikohoels, their martyrdom in spite of their Soviet loyalties. Indeed, Jews who sang the glory of Communism did not escape A , the enmity and hatred of Stalin. They were among the executed on trumped-up charges. They had created a stimulus for Jewish unity against Hitlerism, yet their Communism was anti-Jewish. Gilboa relates, for example, Feffer's "repudiation of the Jewish past" and his adher- ence to a bezbozhnik—ungodly--attitudes in jeering at Jewish traditions. Gilboa tells how Communist efforts were part of "a deliberate and systematic Soviet drive to diminish the Jewish image and even eradi- cate its traces." Books by Howard Fast that were Jewish in content were omitted from Soviet bibliographies. Maxim Gorky's pro-Jewish writings were ignored. There were many manifestations of anti-Semitism. The. Joint Distribution Committee's humanitarian labors were denigrated and JDC was branded "Zionist." There are hatreds dating back through the years under review in this valuable work—many years before the present outburst of anti-Israel and anti-Zionist attitudes. Thus, it is clear that what is happening today is an inheritance from anti-Semitic attitudes of Stalin and his cohorts and of earlier Czarist times. Gilboa's book provides the historic background for today's sad Jewish experiences with the Kremlin.