Purely Commentary

A Community Challenge: Is It Possible That Arbitration

Can Be Ruled Out Among Reasonable Men?

Controversies over the status of our Hebrew teachers have reached
a sad state. The disputes are not to the credit of a great community whose
educational and public relations approaches have heretofore -beets---oin a
high level.
When paid advertising is finally resorted to with a question "who
owns our schools?", the impasse in reaching accord is not complimentary.
Only one basic question needs to be answered: does anyone fear
arbitration?
For several years we have pleaded for accord through arbitration
in our columns because of the conviction that an impartial group of medi-
ators can always solve an issue and avoid bitterness.
A community need not fear difference of opinion. We are strong
enough and competent enough to face issues and to confront challenges.
But when a matter involving the community's major needs—those of edu-
cation of our children—reach a stage of possible strikes and charges of
nepotism, it is time to take stock.
It was not necessary to permit the matter to reach this stage of
bitter disputes. There is nothing honorable in stubbornness that resists
mediation. There is greater dignity in bending one's honors in the inter-
est of amity—as long as it does not defect from just approaches to one's

fellow men—and the teachers and the administrators are fellows in a
single society.
What if the teachers were resorting to union machinations that were
r
e
unsavory? What if the administration's claims were
ajmi
nistration
Or, adopting the reverse assumption: what if the ed
were wrong but the teachers were too panicky over tenure, testing of
teachers, problems they consider the result of "harassment?"
Does that mean the community should say "a plague on both your
houses" and permit strikes, closing of schools, name-calling?
Does not the entire situation indicate that if a committee of im-
partial people were to sit down and review the situation rancor could
be avoided and we could return to proper functioning of our schools?
It is so difficult to view any situation that might obviate conciliation
through arbitration!
The impasse has reached its farthest point of non-cooperation. Now
is the time for impartiality to be injected to restore within the schools a
spirit of good will and a readiness for activity that will not hinder our
educational programs. Let there be such an approach promptly in order
that the personality controversies be both ended and avoided in the future
and that there should be accord in the interest of a wholesome school
system.

The Russian Bear ... Kremlin Tactics and the Ransom Tax on Academicians

When 78 of the 100 members of the U.S. Senate
give endorsement to the view that a nation favored
with a trade agreement with this country must not
be guilty of an attempt to extort blackmail from its
Jewish citizens, they indicate that they are con-
cerned that the Soviet Union should not be permitted
to enforce a ransom upon potential emigres. The
75 who added their voices to Senator Henry M. Jack-
son's in effect expressed their desire to see justice
done to people who have a preference in choice of
statehood—a principle set forth in the United Na-
tions Human Rights Declaration.

Very few of the 78 senators who are supporting
the Jackson Amendment have large Jewish constit-
uencies. Most of them come from states with very
small Jewish populations. It is no wonder, therefore,
that the Time magazine comment that the Jackson
Amendment was "catering to the Jewish vote"
should have aroused so much resentment. It is the
sort of bias that stems from the disgusting emphasis
already placed on the so-called "Jewish vote" which
is defined not on the basis of the social standards
pursued by Jews when they go to the polls but as
means of adding to the sensationalism that has
engulfed most of the American press.

pondent, cabling from Moscow about the first fami-
lies to be given permission to emigrate from the
USSR without paying the heavy tax that had first
been demanded from university graduates, made
these important observations:
"Six of the families had been told only 48 hours
earlier that they would have to pay a total of 180,-
000 rubles ($195,000) in fees, based on their levels
of education, to obtain the exit visas for which
they had otherwise qualified.

mollify

emigration to

a 'parasite' or non predate-

•

. •

FACT:

"The move appeared to be timed to coincide
with the White House announcement on Oct. 18 of
a trade agreement with the Soviet Union and was
presumably intended to
congressional
opposition to the trade package."

But harassment has not ended. There are abuses
that are not hidden, and it is fortunate that Am-
erican correspondents are able to inform about
the realities of an outrageous situation that has
inspired the American protests and the actions of
the majority of the Senate and a very large
number of members of the House of Representa-
tives. In his report on the situation, Hedrick Smith
cabled to the New York Times regarding the Jewish
activists who are demanding emigration visas to
leave Russia for Israel and who expressed their
Sentiments similar to those expressed in the U.S.
views at a news conference with foreign corres-
Senate are heard also in the U.S. House of Repre-
pondents:
sentatives, many of whose members have declared
"A spokesman for the activists noted that those
that they would vote against granting the USSR
approved Oct. la were almost entirely recent ap-
most-favored-nation status if the "ransom" scheme
plicants and insisted that their own complaints of
is perpetuated. A study of the endorsers of this
harassment of long-time applicants were still
view, in both the Senate and the House of Repre-
valid.
sentatives, will indicate That the overwhelming ma-
"Prof. Alexsandr Lerner, former bead of a
jority does not represent sizable Jewish communities,
cybernetics institute until his dismissal in Decem•
and most of them come from areas where Jews are
her after his application for
at most a mere handful. The Time charge is, there-
Israel,
said that militia officers had visited his home 10
fore, unjust, misleading and an insult to the
intelligence of the American legislators who were
times in the last week to deliver warnings that
unless he obtained work within two weeks he
motivated in backing the Jackson Amendment by a
would be prosecuted as
sense of justice.
-
live member of society, subject to a jail sentence
Those seeking to belittle the congressional objec-
or compulsory labor.
tives by charging that it results from Jewish pres-
"Others said that similar warnings were given
sures are being given food for thought in the latest
to Prof. Alexsandr Va Voronel, a 41-year-old physi.
developments which indicate that Russian politi-
cist. In all, they said, police officers had visited
cians are more realistic than Time editors. Reuters,
22 Jewish families recently with intimidating
reporting from Moscow that 176 USSR families had
questions on the subject of work.
been freed of the tax obligations (the number is
"As a practical matter, they said, It is virtually
rising!), noted in the cabled report of its correspon-
impossible for them to get work because their
dent that "It is not yet clear whether this is a
work books carry notations that they have been
selective move to appease outraged American opin-
dismissed from their regular jobs because of ap-
ion or a step toward quiet abandonment of the
plications to go to Israeli. A few intellectuals have
measure." Whatever it is, it is undoubtedly the re-
nonetheless managed to obtain work as watchmen,
sult of an expression of public opinion in protest
upholsterers or laborers in bakeries or theaters.
against an outrageous blackmail scheme.
"Dr. Lerner, who at Se, is 10 months from
State Department officials have been unable to
pensionable age and recently underwent abdomi-
interpret the new Russian attitude. Richard Mass,
nal surgery and must face another operation, said
executive director of the National Conference on
he had refused to take manual labor. He said
Soviet Jewry, does not view the new development
when he complained about the pressures on him
as "a trend." Judy Silver Shapiro was told over the
to a precinct police captain, he was told not to
telephone from Moscow by her husband, Gavriel
worry about getting a job.
Shapiro, who has just been given permission to
"Viktor Jolsky, a 42-year-old engineer and
leave Russia and to join his wife in the United
physicist, and Roman Rutman, a 38-year-old math•
States, that he regards the Soviet waivers as a
ematacian, said they and others had been taken to
"token gesture," brought about by pressure from
jails outside Moscow for 10 days during President
the U.S. There is no other way of interpreting what
Nixon's visit last May.
has just happened than that it was the effect of
"Others asserted that young Moscow Jews
many protests against the inhumanities stemming
were arrested, harassed and some beaten when
from the Kremlin. Which serves as a signal to
the police tried to disperse crowds outside the
libertarians not to abandon the pressures.
Moscow synagogue during recent Jewish boil-
Perhaps we should be grateful to Time for its
days."
appeal to prejudice when it charges "catering to
It is because the truth always emerges that
the Jewish vote." It has reopened the very issue of
injustice can, hopefully, be averted. Sure, there is
the right of voters to express their views and to
a Jewish voice demanding justice. It is more im-
exert influence upon their representatives in Con-
portant than the Jewish vote because the response
gress.
is nonpartisan and is based on human considera-
Meanwhile, the Russian tactics are being exposed
tions.
in their barest aims at humiliating those seeking
The cold war is like a fever: it's both hot and
exit visas. Hedrick Smith, New York Times corres- cold. Russia abuses us and misrepresents the g reat

.

By Philip
Slomoyitz

Any Reason to Fear Arbitration Methods in Tackling
Communal Controversies? . . . Arab Terrorists Tested
by Sensible Methods .... The Kremlin's Tax Dilemmas

ficw.940 ,s•w AA vicirsM W (NI& bit y',,X stnr big 'IAA Si

3 050. r

During the past nine
months, the Jewish Agency
has had to spend more
than $53 11--,•itlior-L. with
-Funds from UJA-- to
provide new apartments
-for trrirnigr-ants from
the Soviet Unica.

Arab Terrorists: Suspicion of Them in Civilised
Society is Embarrassment of Their Own Making

Fatah *gent

was
A Libyan Embassy clerk who was a chief El
murdered in Rome. It was a simple matter for the Arab guerrillas
to charge that "Zionist" agents were responsible for the act. But
Italian police now are advancing the view that dissident Arab groups
are responsible for the death of Abdel Well Zuaiter, that there is a
feud among the Arabs and that the victim of the assassins, who was
unknown to the Israeli Embassy in Rome, must have antagonized his
compatriots.

A battle royal is waging among Arab terrorist groups and Yasir
Arafat's position has been endangered, according to Beirut reports.
If it had not been for the exaggerations that come from the craving
for notoriety in the press, several factors would have been established
without challenge: major among them is the Lebanese determination
not to permit the terrorists to drear their ugly heads to the detriment
of their country, and the acknowledged Israeli record of shunning

assassinations.

Now we have reports of another coup by his own military leaders
against Sadat, and the reports of Arab ploys for added kidnapings
and assassinations include an attempt on the life of West Germany's
President Gustav Heinemann. The latter plot stems from the resent-
ments against the German searches of Arabs coming to their country
in an effort to forestall repetitions of the Munich outrage. But the
United States also Is making such thorough searches of Arabs coming
to this country, and these policies by countries seeking to prevent
atrocities have been forced upon democratic countries by a terrorism
for which Arabs have not even apologized. Whatever suspicion exists
is of the Arabs' own asking. Let them end the inhumanities and they
will emerge again as members of the civilized society.

libertarian Zionist cause. In Jewish ranks there isn't a good word
for Russia, out of suspicion that there isn't an iota of fraternalism for
Jews in or out of Russia.

Yet, the Russians are releasing Jews, thousands are settling in
Israel, in the course of time there will be emigres from the USSR
settled in the United States and Canada — and in time we may even
witness a new approach to Jewish demands for cultural and religious
rights in the Soviet Union.
Why, then, doesn't the Kremlin get a bit closer in friendship with
Israel, the Jewish people, her own Jewish citizens? Is it possible that
a great nation can perpetuate an inane attitude and unwise states-
manship?
Will the Russian Bear eventually dance a tune that will protect
his own skin and at the same time make it possible for the outside
world to pet him amicably?

2 — Friday, Oct
s . 27 Vi72

•••• vat "...AA: ...........0e7 •.s • IN XV:.

THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS
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