- A Report from
Rio de Janeiro:
Role of
Brazilian
Jewish
Community
Commentary
Page 2
VOL. LXIX, No. 11
THE JEWISH NEWS
A Weekly Review
f Jewish Events
17515 W. Nine Mile, Suite 865, Southfield, Mich. 48075 424-8833
Cynicism
'Politicized'
•
Kissinger
in the Limelight
•
Yiddish
Theater at 100
Editorials
Page 4
$10.00 Per Year ; This Issue 30c
May 21, 1976
Warm Ford Speech Backs Israel,
ut Pushes for Pre-1967 Borders
U.S. - Jewish Leaders
Hit Agnew Statements
NEW YORK (JTA)
American Jewish leaders reacted
sharply to former Vice President Spiro Agnew's attack on
"Zionist influences in the U.S." and the American media and his
charges of "Israeli imperialism" and "aggression." Agnew made
his allegations during an interview on the nationally televised
NBC "Today" show last week and in Newsweek magazine this
week.
Mrs. Charlotte Jacobson, chairman of the American Section
of the World Zionist Organization, noted that "a good deal of"
Agnew's business activities since his resignation from the Vice
Presidency in 1973 has been "on behalf of those same Saudi Ara-
bians he claimed 'have been our very staunch friends over a period
of 60 years.' "
Mrs. Jacobson observed_ that "In view of Mr. Agnew's
special relationship with Saudi Arabian interests, one can
readily understand his comments on the lack of an 'even-
handed' U.S, policy in the area, and even his echoing of Arab
claims of Israel 'imperialism taking place in the world' what-
ever that means, and of Zionist 'influences' on the media." -
Rabbi Alexander Schindlef, chairman of the Conference of
Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, said: "Spiro
Agnew has disgraced himself once again with his despicable
statement, so redolent of the venom and slander we have come to
expect from the anti-Semitic lunatic fringe . . . But if most
Americans will disregard Mr. Agnew's statement, considering its
content and its source, there is new encouragement and hope for
those hate mongers for whom 'Zionist' is a code word for 'Jew' and
who must today be dancing with -delight over the latest and most
notorious recruit to their ranks."
Benjamin R. Epstein, national director of the Bnai Brith An-
ti-Defamation League, characterized Agnew's remarks as "irre-
sponsible anti-Semitic statements maligning Affierican Jews and
the American press" which "are shocking and deplorable and fur-
ther discredit him." -Epstein charged that Agnew was "parroting
the Arab propaganda line" and observed that "this comes as no
surprise in light of his activities in behalf of Arab petrodollar
countries seeking to invest in the United States."
Rabbi Arthur Hertzberg, president of the American Jewish
Congress, declared that "Mr. Agnew's statements on the Middle
East are as accurate and as honest as his public record led the
American people to expect. One wonders how much of his opinion
derives from his reported lucrative association with Arab busi-
ness interests."
(Continued on Page 8)
WASHINGTON (JTA)
President Ford personally and publicly has reaffirmed again that
"there has not and will not be any erosion of American-Israel friendship" and emphasized that "our
role in supporting Israel honors our own heritage." In issuing this reassurance during an address to
some 1,000 persons attending the American Jewish Committee's 70th annual meeting here last Thurs-
day night, the President also declared:
"While America must and will pursue friendship with all nations, this will never be done at the
expense of America's commitment to Israel." This statement evoked the loudest applause during his
address. Ford affirmed, "Our commitment to Israel will meet the test of American steadfastness and
resolve. My Administration will not be found wanting." He also stressed that America "will remain
the ultimate guarantor of Israel's freedom."
Ford's address, at the AJCommittee's annual dinner, confirmed in effect the pledges made to
Israel by Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger in the Chizuk Amuno Synagogue in Baltimore
five nights before and in Ford's letter to Rep. William Broomfield (R-Mich.), published in The
Jewish News last week. The President, who received four standing ovations, was the second
chief executive to appear at an AJCommittee function. President Lyndon B. Johnson attended
the AJCommittee's 60th anniversary meeting in 1966.
While he emphasized his support to Israel, Ford also indicated his Administration would continue
to press for Israeli withdrawal from territories it occupied in the Six-Day War as a means to achieve a
peace settlement and that he does not favor funds for Israel beyond the $4.4 billion he has recom-
mended for the 27-month period ending .Sept. 30, 1977.
Israel supporters in Congress believe
the funds should be increased by a half bil-
lion dollars to take into account the three
months between the end of the current fis-
cal year and the start of fiscal 1977.
"We appreciate Israel's dilemma in
moving towards peace," Ford said with re-
ference to the administered areas. "Israel
WASHINGTON (JTA) — Arab efforts to equate Zion-
ism with racism have backfired sharply among Christian
is asked to relinquish territory — a con-
groups in the United States, according to a survey made
crete and essentially irreversible step — in
public by the American Jewish Committee.
return for basically intangible political
Rabbi Marc H. Tanenbaum, national interreligious af-
measures but it is only willingness to dare
fairs director of the AJCommittee, speaking at a dinner of
the
exchange of the tangible for the intan-
the organization's Inter-religious Affairs Commission,
gible
that hostility can be ended and peace
prior to the formal opening of AJCommittee's 70th annual
attained."
meeting, said that the UN General Assembly resolution
On the funding, he said he favors aid
equating Zionism with racism "aroused Christian opinion
to
Israel
of more than $4 billion in the
as seldom before." This storm of criticism in America and
two budgets he has submitted to Con-
_in many parts of the world "has thus far proven to be coun-
gress "because it is so clearly in the na-
terproductive to the goals of Arab propaganda," he noted.
Analyzing the 74-page survey, conducted by Judith
tional security interest of the United
Banik, assistant director of -the interreligious affairs de-
States and so essential to preserve and
partment, Tanenbaum said: "Both the substance of the res-
promote peace in the Middle East."
olution and its, adoption by the UN. were widely denounced
Following the President to the ros-
by Christian groups and leaders in the United States and
trum, Israeli Ambassador Simcha Dinitz,
—
Gentile Response to
Zionism-Racism Vote
Backfired on Arabs
(Continued on Page 6)
(Continued on Page 22)
Or. Voss Calls for Christian Atonement for Anti-Jewish Wrongs
(Editor's note: Dr. Voss is professor of philosophy and religion and chairman of
humanities at Edward Waters College, Jacksonville, Fla.; a leader in the American
Christian Palestine Committee movement for many years and one of the distin-
guished Christian supporters of Israel and Zionism; and an associate and friend of
the late Dr. Stephen S. Wise. He is currently a scholar-in-residence at the Ecumeni-
cal Institute for Advanced Theological Studies at Tantur in Jerusalem, on the road to
Bethlehem.)
JERUSALEM —
BY DR. CARL HERMANN VOSS
A number of us here at Tantur were, to say the least, apprehensive,
even alarmed, when we heard that Dr. Martin Marty, associate editor of the perennially
anti-Zionist, often anti-Israel "Christian Century" and professor of history at the Univer-
sity of Chicago's divinity school, was to speak at the centennial observance of the Hebrew
Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion here in Jerusalem; and even more so when he
consented to accept the invitation of the Ecumenical Institute to address our seminar on
"Current Issues in the Jewish/Christian Dialogue" on the subject of "Christian Attitudes
Toward the Land of Israel."
I had taken Dr. Marty to task only recently in a long letter in which I had objected to
what seemed to me to have been disparaging, demeaning comments about his erstwhile
colleague and fellow-historian, Dr. Franklin H. Littell of Temple University, author of
"The Crucifixion of the Jews" and national chairman of Christians Concerned for Israel.
In addition, I had written Dr. Marty that I felt the "Christian Century" owed an
apology to the late Dr. Stephen S. Wise for having virtually called him a liar in a widely
heralded controversy of almost 35 years ago when Rabbi Wise, at the suggestion of Assist-
ant Secretary of State Sumner Welles and with his full permission, had publicly an-
-nounced that Adolph Hitler was two-and-one-half million corpses along the way toward
his promised extermination of the Jewish people as a "final solution" to the "Jewish prob-
lem" in that year of disgrace, 1942.
The "Christain Century" had questioned whether "any good purpose had been
served by Wise's announcement," and later claimed that the U.S. State Department
denied having given Dr. Wise any encouragement to release the information about
Hitler's lethal intent.
I might note that the years-long animus of the "Christian Century" to Jewry and
Judaism, to Zionism and Israel, is amply documented in the thorough research of Dr.
Hertzel Fishman in his "American Protestantism and a Jewish State" (Wayne State Uni-
versity Press).
As for the magazines cruel attack on Dr. Stephen Wise in the late fall-early winter of
1942/43, the incidents and the exchanges of letters are to be found in my own two books,
"Rabbi and Minister: The Friendship of Stephen S. Wise and John Haynes Holmes" and
"Stephen S. Wise: Servant of the People — Selected Letters."
When Marty arrived in Jerusalem and resided with us at the Institute at Tantur, we
discussed the facetious remarks about Littell; and he seemed to take them lightly, cer-
tainly not to be thought of as by us a serious, damaging attack.
As for the Stephen Wise episode, that was three-and-one-half decades ago he
said, and he had no intention going about to pick up the pieces of his several-times-
removed predecessor, Dr. Charles Clayton Morrison, with whose views on every-
thing from marriage-and-divorce to Prohibition, from the Outlawry of War Pact of
(Continued on Page 56)