THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS""

Cooperation With West Hard Task for Israel

THE FINEST AND
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By SOLLY PRESS

JOHANNESBURG
(JTA) — In Israel's joyous
32nd year an irony has be-
come apparent: just Alien
the Jewish state is making a
breakthrough towards
regional cooperation, the
West appears to be doing its
utmost to undo that inci-
pient, incremental process.
Is this truly a new variation
of Europe's old maxim, "di-
vide et imperia" — to divide
and rule? Is the West afraid
at, should the warring,
alkanized Mideast states
move towards real regional
cooperation, such as the
European Economic Com-
munity, (EEC), that the
lands of the silken curtain
might comprise a new
power bloc on the world
scene — more powerful than
the Organization of Petro-
leum Exporting Countries
(OPEC) grouping with their
one-crop economies? Do
they fear some new "olive
peril" which seems still to
haunt. Western chancel-
leries with visions of Han-
nibal's elephants and
Mohammed's horsemen?
On the surface at least,
the shadow of irony falling
over the Mideast bears a
striking similarity to the
World War I era, when
Britain's Sir Mark Sykes
and France's Charles Picot
together with the Russian
Czar and the Italian gov-
ernment agreed in 1915-
1916 to divide and rule the
Ottoman Middle East for
Europe's benefit.
Both the pan-Jewish
(Zionist) and pan-Arab
(then Hashemite) leaders
objected that the Sykes-
Picot agreement was in-
consistent with Western
assurances to their
movements.
Even when the Bol-
sheviks led by Leon Trotsky
and Vladimir Lenin opened
the Czar's foreign office
archives in 1917 and made
the Sykes-Picot agreement
public, the Western powers
-,went ahead to divide and
rule the Middle East from
Sinai to Iraq. Later, suita-
ble noises aside, the West
acquiesced in Benito Musso-
lini's conquest of all
Ethiopia, almost a model for
their behavior over Af-
ghanistan.
The words of Christopher
Sykes, son - of Sir Mark

Sykes, on that imperial
period' speak for them-
selves: "So far as the British
government were con-
cerned, they could not wel-
come a Feisal-Weizmann
agreement . ."
It is hard not to think of
those days of Chaim Weiz-
mann and the Emir Feisal
two generations ago, when
witnessing the current dis-
dain that Western Europe
appears to be displaying
towards the Anwar-
Sadat-Begin accord.
Sykes and Picot; Er-
nest Bevin and Adolf Hit-
ler; Valery Giscard d'Es-
taing and Helmut
Schmidt — is there some-
how a mystical link be-
tween them? Far from
looking for hidden mo-
tives or "conspiracies"
against Jewry in particu-
lar and Semites in gen-
eral on the part of the
West, and rather than
searching for morality in
international affairs as
practiced by the powers,
Israel and her supporters
are simply facing the
reassertion of Euro-
interest.
European self-interest —
some would call it oppor-
tunism — is simply return-
ing to the world scene after
its post-war lapse. It is
surely not imperialism. It is
not the ancient hatred of
Judaea or sudden love for
Falastin that motivates
them now. It is merely their
need for oil that makes
those democracies pander to
the whiins of feudal, reac-
tionary sheiks.
And it is not a real con-
cern for the Afghans that
underlies the noises from
the West about the Soviet
invasion. It is the sensing of
an opportunity to embar-
rass the Russians in the
eyes of the resource-rich Af-
ro-Asian world.
Thanks to her founding
fathers, Israel's resilience is
still rooted in her diver-
sified economy and in her
lively democratic system.
The current diplomatic
pressures may cause many
Israelis to feel again the
pangs of international iso-
lation.
Does she become a for-
tress — what the proud
British called "splendid
isolation?" Should she
take comfort in the fact

Yet Israel is by no means
alone on the global scene.
And in her 32nd year she
has a rare opportunity to
influence events in her own
region.
Not only is Israel trying
hard to consolidate her ac-
cord with Egypt and, hope-
fully through Cairo, putting
out feelers to other African
states; she also has an
opportunity to do something
constructive about the
Palestinians and, possibly,
with Arab Asia.

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helicopter pilots and crews

to serve in the Mecca area
for fire prevention duty dur-
ing pilgrimages. At some
point in the orientation
process, the recruits were
told that they would have to
convert to Islam since
non-Moslems are forbidden
in the area according to
Saudi Arabian law.
Foxman said Dynalectron
set up Moslem conversion
programs involving several
days of instruction under
the guidance of a Moslem
hired by the firm for that
purpose. During 1978-1979,
30 Dynalectron employees,
including five pilots, con-
verted.

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Texas Firm Converting
jEmployees for Saudi Work

DALLAS — A U.S. firm
involved in converting em-
loyees to the Moslem reli-
•on as a prerequisite for
working in Saudi Arabia
has engaged in an "offen-
sive and unAmerican prac-
tice," the Anti-Defamation
League (ADL) of Bnai Brith
charged.
Abraham H. Foxman,
ADL's associate national
director, called on U.S. reli-
gious 'leaders and others
"who value freedom of be-
lief" to join in protesting the
actions of the Ft. Worth,
Tex., branch of Dynalectron
Corp.
According to ADL offi-
cials, Dynalectron recruited

that even within her own
region she is not the only
"odd man out?" Must she
accept as permanent Sen.
Patrick Moynihan's cut-
ting description of the
bulk of the UN member-
ship as creating "a thea-
ter of the absurd?"
In certain quarters, pro-
posals of forming a kind of
commonwealth of the
world's pariah states into a
"fifth world" alliance have
been mooted. Does Israel's
future lie in that direction?

Friday, May 16, 1980 17

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