Politics and Religion

Candidates
Confront
Jewish
Constituents
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THE JEWISH NEWS

Nazi Virus in
Latin America
Editorials
Page 4

1. LXX,No.1

Some Tid Bits on a Very
Mooted Issue Covered in
Purely Commentary

A Weekly Review [,

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[ of Jewish Events

17515 W. Mne Mile, Suite 865, Southfield, Mich. 48075 424-8833

Communal
Transformations.
Federations,
Hebrew Schools,
Social Aspects:
Daniel Elazar's
Book Reviewed
on Page 64

$10.00 Per Year ; This Issue 30c September 10, 1976

Boycott Guilt of Commerce Dept.
Emphasized Despite Richardson
Statement That Law Is Enforced

AJCongress Study Confirms
Black Trade With S. Africa

NEW YORK — The apartheid regime of South Africa maintains
"thriving" trade relations with the countries of Black Africa, amount-
ing to hundreds of millions of dollars annually, the American Jewish
Congress said in releasing a study of growing economic ties between
the white-ruled state and its black neighbors. The study, prepare(' by
Moshe Decter, was "undertaken to expose the double standard" that
has been applied to Israel by critics of its trade with South Africa, the
AJCongress said.
The report was accompanied by an exchange of letters between
Bayard Rustin, executive director of the Black Americans to Support
Israel Committee (BASIC), and Rabbi
Arthur Hertzberg, president of the
American Jewish Congress, on the issue
of Israel-South African relations. (See
Commentary, Page 2). -
Rustin had expressed . "a deep sense
of concern and disturbance" about the
visit to Israel last April by Prime Minis-
ter John Vorster of South Africa and the
announcement of plans to expand com-
mercial and other relations between the
two countries.
. In reply, Rabbi Hertzberg cited the
American Jewish Congress study showing
that last year South Africa imported $340
million worth of coffee, timber and other
commodities from Black Africa and ex-
ported $493 million worth of goods.
This "close cooperation," he said,
RABBI HERTZBERG
was "evidence that, for the sake of
economic survival, even profound political differences are often
shunted aside.
"So it is with Black Africa. So it is with Israel."
Such arrangements were "hateful to those committed to the values
of social equality and human dignity," Rabbi Hertzberg said. "But if it
is wrong for Israel to have any relations with South Africa, why is it not
also wrong for Black African states to have such relations?.
"Let us not ask of Israel what we do not ask of the countries of Black
rica and the rest of the world. There can be no double standard in
111Pdging the behavior of nations." •
(Continued on Page 5)

Confronted with the near-unanimous vote of the U.S.
House of Representatives subcommittee that the Depart-
ment of Commerce failed to act against the Arab boycott of
Americans doing business with Israel, Secretary of Com-
merce Elliot Richardson stated Wednesday that the accusa-
tions referred to practices of the past. He declared that the
law prohibiting discrimination in trade relations with
foreign nations is now being strictly enforced.
WASHINGTON (JTA) — A House subcommittee that
has been inve:. Ligating for 18 months Arab boycott prac-
tices against American companies trading with Israel
said Tuesday in an extensive report signed by 15 of its 16
members that the Department of Commerce "actually
serves to encourage" the practices and recommended
specific legislation to deter them.
ELLIOT RICHARDSON
The report by the subcommittee on oversight and
investigations led by Rep. John Moss (D-Calif.) concluded that "at least $4.5 billion
worth of U.S. sales and proposed sales to Arab countries in 1974 and 1975 were
subject to boycott requests." It estimated that American exporters "complied with
at least 90 percent" of all boycott requests "contained in boycott-affected sales
documents reported to the department during the last two years."
The department, the report also charged, encouraged the boycott "implicitly
by condoning activity declared against national policy or simply by looking the
other way while these practices grew."
At a news confetence at which the
some of the 30,000-word report was
made public, Moss, Rep. James Scheuer
(D-NY) who requested the subcommit-
tee investigation in March 1975, and
PARIS (JTA) — An international confer-
Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) blamed
ence against the increasing politicization of
former Commerce Secretary Rogers
specialized organizations such as UN-
C. B. Morton and the Commerce De-
ESCO, the World Health Organization and
partment's policy since 1965 as being
the International Labor Organization will
chiefly responsible for what Scheuer
meet in Paris next month with the partici-
pation of Nobel Prize winners, labor lead-
called "a record of 10 years of shame."
ers, writers, philosophers and top stars in
The Export-Administration Act,
the entertainment world.
passed in 1965, calls for reports from
The one-day conference, Oct. 2, will call
American companies subjected to de-
on the international organizations to "stick
mands by Arab countries against com-
to their task" instead of dealing with politi-
panies that trade with Israel or those
cal issues and adopting anti-Israeli resolu-
owned or administered by Jews. Mor-
tions.

Paris Conference
Hits World Bodies

(Continued on Page 12)

(Continued on Page 6)

M.E. Diplomatic Flurry in 1977 Predicted

BAYARD RUSTIN

MONTREAL (JTA) — Former Israeli Foreign Minister Abba Eban, here for a dialogue with the leaders
of the Combined Jewish Appeal, told a press conference that "1977 will be a year of intensive diplomatic
activity with the United States in the role of a unique mediator between Israel and the Arab states."
He explained that the Soviet Union has ruled itself out of the negotiating because it has no relations with
Israel and the United Nations is out for its extreme resolution. "I see with anxiety the absence of diplomatic
activity which cannot but harden the position of the Arab states," he told reporters.
He stressed that if peace is established between the Arab states and Israel there are people in Israel
sympathetic to. the idea of territorial concessions and the side-by-side co-existence of Israelis and Pales-
tinians in the context of a Jordanian-Palestinian state. "If there were peace, we will be very pleased to
relinquish the control of one million Arabs," he said.
He said that during the last year, U.S. influence in the Middle East became more powerful and that Arab
states used "their technical flexibility" when speaking with one voice to the Western countries and another
one to their own people.
In order to convince the Israeli people of their willingness to live side-by-side with Israel the Arabs must
recognize the legitimacy of the state of Israel even without having diplomatic relations, similar to the way
the U.S. now has relations with the People's Republic of China.

ABBA EBAN

