THE JEWISH NEWS
USPS 275 520i
Incorporating The Detroit Jewish Chronicle commencing with the issue of July 20, 1951
Member of American Association of English-Jewish Newspapers and National Editorial Association and
Affiliate Member of National Newspaper Association and Capital Club.
Published every Friday by The Jewish News Publishing Co., 17515 W. Nine Mile, Suite 865, Southfield, Mich. 48075
Postmaster: Send address changes to The Jewish News, 17515 W. Nine Mile, Suite 865, Southfield, Mich. 48075
Second-Class Postage Paid at Southfield, Michigan and Additional Mailing Offices. Subscription $15 a year.
CARMI M. SLOMOVITZ
PHILIP SLOMOVITZ
Business Manager
Editor and Publisher
ALAN HITSKY
News Editor
HEIDI PRESS
Associate News Editor
DREW LIEBERWITZ
Advertising Manager
Sabbath Scriptural Selections
This Sabbath, the 12th day of Tevet, 5741, the following scriptural selections will be read in our synagogues:
Pentateuchal portion, Genesis 47:28-50:26. Prophetical portion, I Kings 2:1-12.
Candle lighting, Friday, Dec. 19, 4:45 p.m.
VOL. ',XXVIII. No. 16
Page Four
Friday, Dec. 19. 1980
ISRAEL: GLOBAL FOOTBALL
Israel has become the football on an interna-
tional gridiron.
Lots of indivisuals, self-selected teams, even
nations, are taking turns at kicking her.
It begins at the United Nations, which has
abandoned the role of the peace-maker and has
become the anti-Israel warmonger. It has
spread among the nations, and only Uncle Sam
dares veto the frequent stab-in-the-back. Some
Jews have entered the arena as contributors to
the confusion. All nations reject attempts by
outsiders to inject themselves into their inter-
nal affairs. Israel is the pigskin for kick-offs, no
matter whether the aim is within Israel or
wherever her image becomes visible.
While the leading nations in the Middle East
are scrambling for power and territory and are
divided in their aims, the targeting of Israel
continues. The UN hasn't time to make peace
and is preoccupied with the search for a means
of isolating Israel to a devastating degree.
So hateful is the campaign that cartoonists,
who have the power of policy-making, have
joined in the rampage. Their chief scapegoat is
Menahem Begin, and the manner in which he is
often portrayed is reminiscent of the Stuermer
days in Nazi Germay.
These are neither exaggerations nor fan-
tasies. The credibility acquired by the PLO is
making Israel's road to peace nigh impossible,
and the path toward security for the embattled
area is strewn with thorns for the Israelis.
Will there be an erosion of support for Israel
in the U.S. Congress, especially in view of the
revealed antagonism of Senator Charles Percy
who is scheduled to head the Senate Foreign
Relations Committee? Senator Daniel Patrick
Moynihan joined President-Elect Ronald Re-
agan in disavowing Percy's endorsement of the
PLO and its leader, the boaster of terrorism,
Arafat, and his encouragement for the estab-
lishment of another Arab state, a Palestinian
one bordering on Israel.
May it be true that Percy speaks for himself
and that, as Moynihan declares, the Senate will
not back him in sponsoring a PLO-controlled
state. Percy may plead all he wants that the
report of his backing of PLO and Arafat were
taken out of context. His earlier assertions
linked with the current indict him, and Moyni-
han's repudiation should be judged as the basis
for what may be a new battle for justice, with
the U.S. Senate as the staged battleground.
That this new turn of events involving
American concern in the Middle East should
have occurred on the eve of the inauguration of
the next President of the United States is one of
the most shocking blows aimed at Israel. With
the U.S. still the world's only spark of courage in
a world filled with antagonism towards a small
nation in a very volatile area, it is deplorable
and also frightful that an effort should be made
to cast a shadow over the only bright light in the
world darkened for inheritors of the memories
of the Holocaust.
The comfort to be derived by assurances from
Senator Moynihan, by the confidence exuded
from the Reagan ranks, by the friendships ex-
pressed by many members of Congress, in a
measure allay some of the fears of the immi-
nence of a conflict which will challenge the
steadfastness of devotion towards Israel's secu-
rity.
It is this need for steadfastness that becomes
so vital for Israel and the Jewish people at this
time. Once again there is the great need to pre-
vent the divisiveness that can be more damag-
ing than the extremest of hate-mongering di-
rected at Israel. The moment there is evidenced
even the minutest of cracks in the unity of the
Jewish people and in the support that is tradi-
tionally provided by people with a sense of jus-
tice, as soon as it becomes evident that the one-
ness of Jewry is not factural, then the case of
justice will become collapsible.
There are Jews, perhaps their number is
growing, who are misled by unfortunate occur-
rences in Israel. That Israeli forces should have
to be called into action to quell rioting has be-
come a cause for criticism and condemnation. It
is a tragic and upsetting situation, yet time may
prove that without the action generated, Is-
rael's security might be very seriously under-
mined in the very heart of the land fighting for
existence. With 600,000 Arabs sharing citizen-
ship in Israel, many can be motivated by- the
blood-thicker-than-water truism which al-
ways has the element of fifth-columnism. These
and many other matters must be considered
while viewing the regrettable events in Israel.
Yet there cannot, there must not, be an ignor-
ing of the basic fact of Israel always on the
defensive and under compulsion of fighting for
existence and just rights. In support of such
conditions it is the human factor that is called
into being, demanding unified action never to
permit the undermining of Israel's position. De-
struction of unity can only be judged as betrayal
of common decency and the aim for an assur-
ance of human rights for a nation isolated and
surrounded by enemies. The unity of Jewry and
its- friends is vital to the civilized needs in a
world condition that would otherwise drag
mankind into medieval barbarism.
REMEMBERING WALLENBERG
"Better late than not at all" applies well to the
efforts to secure the release of the eminent hero
in the rescue efforts of Nazi victims in Hungary,
Raoul Wallenberg.
He was never forgotten, although the at-
tempts to secure the release of the courageous
rescuer of tens of thousands were unsuccessful.
Now, thanks to the activities of Annette Lan-
tos, and the support she enlisted, the task has
assumed global importance.
Books are being written about one of the most
eminent of the heroes in the resistance to Hit-
lerism. Films are in the making and documen-
taries are being prepared.
Will these efforts, the demonstrations in his
name, the appeals to the conscience of the world,
serve the purpose?
One fact remains incontrovertible: the name
Raoul Wallenberg will not be forgotten; the re-
spect for his labors will be remembered, Raoul
Wallenberg is a name that will be imperishable
in Jewish and world history.
Holocaust Themes
Several Children's Books
Authored by Peggy Mann
Peggy Maim gained popularity for several important works. Her
biography of Golda Meir was a best seller. Then she acquired addi-
tional fame for her biography of Ralph Bunche, which was published
in 1975 by Coward, McCann and Geoghegan.
Her "Golda: The Life of Israel's Prime Minister" first appeared as
a hard cover book in 1972, as a Coward, McCann and Geoghegan
publication. Since then it has been reissued as a paperback by Simon
and Schuster Pocket Books. In both, Miss Maim was a best seller
author. Distinguishing her as well are her
children's books. Based on one of her
widely-acclaimed books dealing with
the Holocaust and the rescue difficul-
ties, she wrote "The Secret Ship"
(Doubleday). It is now among the
widely-recommended works for youth
to become acquainted with the horrors
of the Nazi era and the escapes and the
urgencies of rescue efforts, many of
which had failed.
In 1975, MacMillan published a
32-page booklet for children by Miss
Mann. It was entitled the Last Road
to Safety," also from The Last Es-
cape." Illustrated by George Stay-
rinos, this also became sort of a
textbook for Jewish schools as a guide
PE GG1( MANN
to an understanding of the rescue
need, the tragedies and the failures.
Miss Mann's latest book is "Gizelle, Save the Children," to be
published in January by Everest House. It is the story of Gizelle
Hersch and her three sisters and how they survived the horrores of
Auschwitz. The book, co-authored by Miss Hersch, offers a searing
condemnation of the July 1938 conference in the French resort town
Evian-les Ba,ins.
Miss Mann utilized her speech at the Detroit Jewish Book Fr
recall that failure in rescue efforts, the ill-fated Evian Confere.,
Peggy Mann has authored 32 books. She has also written numer-
ous short stories and articles for most of the major U.S. magazi-
Her books and short stories have been widely reprinted abroad,
she has written for radio and television.
Her first novel was "A Room in Paris" (Doubleday). She adapted
the novel as a network televison drama starring John Cassevetes. She
is the only writer to have had two of her children's books dramatized
on network television in a single year. The Street of the Flower
Boxes" (NBC) received a Peabody Award. "My Dad Lives in a
Downtown Hotel" (ABC) was nominated for an Emmy as the best
children's drama of the year.
Peggy Mann's collective theme is, in the main, to keep memory
alive about the Holocaust, emphasizing the "Remember" and "Never
Forget" theme as tribute to the victims of Nazism. Her reconstruction
of the numerous attempts to rescue the Jewish masses in Hitler-
dominated areas and the failures, her expose of neo-Nazism and of
escapees from punishment, have given special status to her literary
accomplishments.