Nal erP. TM? 3111 (1.4J'ul • A CI :7 tl 'AY • ' , 1_ _ ' THE JEWISH N EW a g v " rt q 7" 4 eh rl Nf eit ea Incorporating The Detroit Jewish Chronicle commencing with issue of July 20, 1951 Member American Association of English.Jewish Newspapers, Michigan Press Association, National Editorial Associa- tion. Published every Friday by The Jewish News Publishing Co., 17515 W. Nine Mile, Suite 885, Southfield, Mich. 48075. Second-Class Postage Paid at Southfield, Michigan and Additional Mailing Offices. Subscription $8 a year. Foreign $9 PHILIP SLOMOVITZ Editor and Publisher CARMI M. SLOMOVITZ Dustman Manager CHARLOTTE DUBIN City Editor DREW LIEBERWITZ - W04.0 J611110; PAY ! Advertising Manager Sabbath Scriptural Selections This Sabbath, the 13th day of Heshvan, 5733, the following scriptural selections will be read in our synagogues: Pentateuchal portion, Gen. 12:1-17:27. Prophetical portion, Isaiah 40:27-41:16. Candle lighting, Friday, Oct. 20, 5:25 p.m. VOL. LXII. No. 6 Page Four October 20, 1972 Truth to the Fore to Demolish Canards Never to be forgiven in Arab attitudes toward Jews is that their collective policies have led Israel to retaliation. Had it not been for the terrorists, there would not have been an invasion of Lebanon to uproot the Fatah concentrations. Were it not for the murder- ous acts, there would have been no retalia- tions. Were it not for the mass murder of doctors and nurses who were on a Hadassah mission of mercy, there might never have been a Deir Yassin. The inhumanity of Arab arrogance which condoned the wave of terror, the threats to Israel's existence, the spread of rumors and distortions, all combine to add fuel to a fire that is raging on many fronts. The spread of hatred has become intolerable. An exchange of letters on the subject published by the New York Times throws light on the major bones of contention in the matter of terrorism and retaliation. An Arab .ipologist gave a long list of alleged Jewish atrocities—Deir Yassin, Kaf'r Kassem, Khan Yunis, others. Of course, he failed to indicate that some of ,the tragic occurrences were strictly results of military actions in which Arab lives were lost. Fortunately, paralleling these claims a Christian minister wrote to condemn the ac- cusations relating to Deir Yassin. Abbot A. Rudloff, writing from Wetson, Vt., in re- sponse to a Times article earlier, wrote as follows: Abduliah Bichara's "Mideast: A Can- vas for Fairness" (Op-Ed. Sept. 20) rightly praises "the chivalry and gallantry of the desert which molded the Arabs." But one sentence in that article cannot go un- challenged, and it had better be chal- ,Jenged by a gentile Christian, who looks hack at 20 years' residence in the Middle East. I mean the sentence: "In no instance throughout the history of the tragedy of Palestine had the Arabs tried to emulate the terrorism thrust upon them in the Deir Yassin massacre." That Deir Yassin is brought up again and again by Arabs is, in my opinion, a tacit testimony in favor of Israel. It seems to be the only case available. But the case of Deir Yassin is not at all clear. It was a war action. The inhabitants were warned by loudspeaker. I will simply quote one testimony of an Arab inhabitant of Deir United Foundation From sonic 50 member agencies in 1949, the United Foundation has become the sup- porter of 164 charitable social service move- ments in our community. All faiths, all racial groups, every element that needs support and cooperation in its health, welfare and recreational activities, depends upon the United Foundation for help in order to be able to exist and to render services to the less affluent. It is reported that one out of every three residents in the tri-county area in which we live gets some form of assistance directly from our UF-supported agencies. It is no wonder that the help of some 150,000 volun- teer workers is needed to raise the vast sums that are so vital for our social service struc- tures. In the coming days and weeks, in order to fulfill our obligations to the 164 agencies that represent all of us, it is of the utmost impor- tance that the United Foundation be given our generous backing. Yassin who survived. Yunes Ahmad As- sad, as published in the Jordanian daily "Al Urdun" of April 9, 1955, wrote: "The Jews never intended to hurt the popula- tion of the village, but were forced to do so after they met enemy fire from the population which killed the Irgun com- mander." The only inaccuracy of this statement is that the Irgun commander was wounded but survived. But before Deir Yassin the Arabs mas- sacred 40 unarmed workers at the Haifa oil refineries. The Jews of Motza and He- bron were ruthlessly massacred (among them the venerable Rabbi Zalman Sach). A convoy of 71 Jewish doctors and nurses, a convoy clearly marked with the medical insignia, was ambushed by Arabs on its way to the Hadassah Hospital on Mount Scopus, and all of its unarmed personnel were senselessly murdered. We are grateful to an eminent Christian for calling attention to them and for giving emphasis to truth in an incident that has brought so much anguish to Israel. • • • In quest for the views of Arabs residing in this country on the Middle East tensions, the New York Times published a report by John L. Hess. While the outlined reactions are filled with bias, misrepresentation of facts, unjustified animosities, we should be grateful for the Hess presentation because it provides an opportunity to expose the dis- tortions. There is the political angle. Arabs are dis- gusted with both McGovern and Nixon for friendly attitudes toward Israel. This matter should be left to statesmen for reply. There is an American interest in the Middle East and a need to keep it free from active con- flicts. To prevent warfare, it is vital that Israel be fully provided with protective means. Only a strong Israel will deter the Arabs from fulfilling the threat to destroy the small state. Nothing else need be taken seriously. A secure Middle East is in the interest of the United States, whether Sadat and Arafat like it or not. But there are some matters in the NY Times article that could mislead people, and they must be refuted. For instance, Arab spokesmen now make much of the unsuccess- ful gun-smuggling that was prevented from developing from Israel to the United States. Anything of this sort is stopped at the source, but Arabs in Brooklyn, the Arab bloc at the UN, the Communist anti-Israelis have at- tempted to make much of it. How can a sen- sible person read such nonsense without a smirk? While even a threat of violence does not emerge above a sensational news story, the Arabs still are sending the bomb letters through the mails. The latest was a letter bomb sent to the Nelly Sachs Home for Elderly in Berlin. That's how these merchants of death are conducting a war! But they seek excuses in unstymied gun-toting. What really takes the cake is Hess' quot- ing in the Times story a Flatbush Avenue gro- cery clerk who "said bitterly": "I have a wife, two children and a father and mother in Jeru- salem, and I cannot see them." Why? There is freedom of travel, without search, for Arabs in Israel, and 160,000 of them came from all-Arab lands to Israel to see friends and relatives the last summer alone. But a Brooklyn grocery clerk gives the impression he is discriminated against! That's the sort of falsehood that gets into print, and there is so much of it that we should be on guard lest the repudiators of falsehoods become too tired and stop answering the libels. -aps. Middlemas' Studies Show Lack of British Refugee Sympathies Official British attitudes that limited immigration of sufferers from Nazism to pre-Israel Palestine, the anti-Semitic trends that were in evidence, the machinations that interfered with proper com- munications in an era of tragedy, are among the revelations in "The Strategy of Appeasement: The British Government and Germany 1937-39," by Keith Middlemas, published by Quadrangle Press. There were struggles then within the British cabinet, and there was misinformation and misrepresentation that affected public opinion. Neville Chamberlain's views emerge here anew, and the attitudes of the appeasing elements are presented in the light of documents now become available. With reference to the move "to suspend or strictly limit Jewish immigration into Palestine," Middlemas' account contains this footnote: "The Cabinet showed itself quite unsympathetic to the problem of Jews escaping from Germany. Even after the horrifying pogrom of 9 November (1938), the Foreign Policy Com- mittee was not prepared to envisage finding place in Britain for more than a fraction of the number expected to flee. They debated, inconclusively, settling Jews in British Guiana or Western Aus- tralia, and blamed the United States for not increasing the American quota (14 November)." Many wanted "to meet Hitler halfway." Middlemas states: "Some of Cordell Hull's advisers feared that the break-up of Czechoslovakia presaged further Germz.n .adventure, and American relations with Germany worsened. After the anti-Semitic outrages of November 1939, Ambassador Wilson was recalled from Berlin. Yet Roosevelt continued to hope that German aggression could be contained peacefully . . ." The author of "Strategy of Appeasement" states also in relation to the events in 1938: "In the anti-Semitic fury which raged after the murder of (Ernst) vom Rath, a German diplomat in Paris on Nov. 9. by a Polish Jew (Herschel Grynszpan), much of the blame for the pogrom was ascribed by the German press to the instigation of British politicians. A footnote to this reads: "Sir (Robert) Vansittart wrote on Dec. 13—"one of the merits of the Jewish persecution in Hitler's eyes is that it enables him to confuse democracy and Jewry in the eyes of the ignorant. Moreover the persecution being bound to excite overt horror furnishes the means to keep alive, by counter press campaigns, German feeling against the democracies and against this country in particular. It is worth noting that the German press cam- paigns are directed rather against us than against France." Keith Middlemas' review of the tragic events of the Nazi era add another valuable chapter to the revelations and commentaries which define the horror instigated by Hitler and his cohorts. Heschel Essays in Paperback Twenty important essays on religious freedom and the human values in our modern life, by Prof. Abraham Joshua Heschel, have been collected for a new paperback issued by Schocken Books. In "The Insecurity of Freedom—Essays on Human Existence," there is a variety of current subjects, commencing with "Religion in a Free Society" which was first published in 1958 by the Fund for the Republic and including texts of addresses delivered at White House Conferences on Children and Youth. The eminent theologian, in these addresses and essays, concerned himself with religion and race, Israel and Diaspora, Jewish education, Jews in the Soviet Union and other matters Which relate to problems that are major in Jewish canmunity planning at this time.