2 Friday; Augusi w 19131. _ THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS Purely Commentary Rationalizing About News Coverage and the Commentators, As Well as Vox Populi A prime minister of any country will not come to Ham- tramck or Royal Oak or Pontiac to sue an abuser for libel. Newspapers find it easy, therefore, to publish letters from biased people accusing the head of a state of being ready to kill anyone in sight. This is how some readers' letters pub- lished in the local newspapers often sound. Yet the editors permit such garbage to gain a place in an important news dispensing media. Such is the pity of current experience. The pity is that it is difficult to tackle such issues because editors make the claim that they must publish all opinions, no matter how they differ. Therefore, they also include trash in meeting what is 'truthfully an obligation: to accept both sides of every issue. The newspapers must have absolute freedom. Editors will not be stymied. But there is a just demand which is always fortified by hopes that when basic truths are un- dermined editors should use their influence either to cor- rect them or to refrain from giving a platform to inciters to hatred. It took a few days for sane minds to set the record straight regarding the most recent occurrences that marked Israel's destruction of the nuclear reactor in Iraq and the bombing of the PLO headquarters in Beirut. Israel was turned into a villain, she was accused of abandoning her moral position in the world, her prime minister was subjected to the sort of abuse that is not accredited to gentlemanly conduct. Some of the best known columnists in the process emerged as barbarians. Fortunately for the record not all newspapers were abusive. The Wall Street Journal came forth on several occasions with explanatory editorial comments to ascertain Israel's rational role in the international community. In an editorial, July 28, entitled "Over to You, Cap," commenting on the role of Secretary of Defense Caspar Weinberger, who is blamed for much of the venom showered upon the Jewish state, the Wall Street Journal stated: Israeli Prime Minister Begin has agreed to a ceasefire, reluctantly and against the advice of his military leaders, to placate the U.S. administra- tion, and principally its military chieftain, De- fense Secretary Weinberger. We hope Mr. Wein- berger and other leaders of the U.S. foreign policy establishment have some good plans afoot, be- cause they have assumed a considerable respon- sibility for Israel's security and the peace of the Middle East. While presumably they are free now to ship Israel those much-delayed F-16s, the prob- lem goes a great deal deeper than that . . . It is not necessarily wise for a U.S. administra- tion to be certain that its ideas for achieving peace are better than the ideas of the Israelis them- selves. The fundamental Israeli approach is to make Arab assaults costly and futile by repelling them with superior force. It is indeed likely that the PLO would not have agreed to the latest truce if it had not been suffering heavy punishment at the hands of Israeli fighter-bombers. While the Israeli approach may have limitations over the long term, it has short-term success. The U.S. has a deep interest in keeping its dip- lomatic ties with Saudi Arabia, and the Saudis maintain a commitment to the PLO cause. But there are fine calculations to be made in this kind of diplomacy. And it is doubtful that the public denunciations by the Administration of the Is- raeli attacks on an Iraqi atom bomb plant and PLO headquarters buildings in Beirut contrib- uted much toward maintaining a proper balance. Secretary Haig, to his credit, seems to have un- derstood this better than Secretary Weinberger. From all appearances the ceasefire works mainly to the benefit of the PLO. Mr. Arafat forced the U.S. and Israel to do business with him, however indirectly. He got the Israeli fighter- bombers off his back. He seemingly gave up very little. Indeed, while the Israelis say they under- stood from the U.S. that the truce would be off if the PLO tries to resupply its forces, the PLO claims no knowledge of any such understanding. The U.S. says the truce doesn't bar resupply. So aside from the longer-term future of Mideast negotiations, the U.S. may soon be faced with the question of what it does if the PLO continues its military build-up, which involves heavy arms from Communist-bloc nations. It was something like this, Syria's insistence on putting ground-to- air missiles in the Bekaa Valley, that helped touch off the latest outbreak of hostilities and prompted the U.S. mediation effort. We ourselves hope that the ceasefire not only holds but becomes a step toward a broader peace, but history is not encouraging. And if the cease- fire breaks down and leads to more fighting with The Media and Israel's Pre-Emptive Strikes, Antagonists in Government and Among the Commentators; Two Defensive Assertions That Throw Light on a Very Muddied Situation By Philip Slomovitz East includes data not to be ignored. Mr. Zion writes: In September 1970, Hussein killed 10,000 Pales- tinians and drove the PLO out of Jordan. From that moment on, the Jordanian border has been virtually without incident. No PLO, no trouble. There is balm in Gilead, but nobody notices. Indeed, President Reagan is asked to press his "client state" Israel to establish a Palestinian entity next door. But not a word is said about leaning on Jordan — a client state if there ever was one — to recognize Israel and join the Camp David Accords. When it comes to Jordan, the memory bank was closed before it opened. I know people who think it's 2,000-years old . . . – Hussein, who took over in 1953, is considered a benign, embattled monarch. Yet from 1948 until 1967, Jordan not only occupied but annexed the West Bank. Without a scintilla of international MENAHEM BEGIN CASPAR WEINBERGER . authority, without the consent of the West Bank • population. And without a whimper from the the PLO armed more heavily, the U.S. might give the Israelis some credit for knowing what they world. Mr. Zion takes into account the Camp David agree- were doing when they were overruled. There is much more to be accounted for, and a New ments, the sacrifices made by Israel in the abandonment of York Times Op-Ed Page article of July 31 makes a defini- the Sinai for the sake of attaining a peace pact. For the sake tive contribution to the search and aspiration for truth and of peace perhaps there will be an influence upon public justice. Appropriately entitling what can be properly opinion and the rational in journalism from -this admoni- designated as an appeal to reason, Sidney Zion, a journalist tion by Mr. Zion: who specializes on the Middle East, called attention to the Israel did not agree to turn over the West Bank and Gaza to the PLO. For this it is accused of loss of life in the struggles in that area that reached the tens intransigence. But why do it, at least until those of thousands, their tragic status having been ignored, who want the territories recognize Israel, not to while the losses caused by the Israel bombing were turned say sue for peace? Have we forgotten that Hussein into a cause celebre. He stated in his essay, "Genesis Re- lost the West Bank because he went to war against written": Israel in 1967? The Middle East memory bank is empty again. Have we forgotten that only yesterday the Arab Just read the papers, watch the television. The world condemned — and still condemns — Sadat new Book of Genesis begins with the raid on the for Camp David? If not, why are we continually Iraqi reactor and climaxes with the bombs over advised that Begin is the obstacle to peace, that he Beiiut. The world is outraged and the world will has isolated Sadat from the Arabs? Does anyone not forget. really believe that the Arab world wants a Pales- The world has forgotten everything else, and if tinian state? Israel's neighbors, if they want the American news media is representative, the peace, have a track to follow. They need only walk world does not want any reminders. It is angry in Sadat's footsteps. with Menahem Begin, it is impatient, it is at wit's History is often intolerable — just ask the end. And so history becomes intolerable. Still, his- Jews. It also instructs — just tell the Arabs. tory has its claims, does it not? And a memory The world has much to learn from the tragic events in bank is the only bank in history that needs a run the Middle East. Israel's position certainly commends re- on it to get back in business. So here are a few spect. The search for villainy leads elsewhere than has been facts. misdirected and Israel was utilized as the available Israel never touched Lebanon until the Pales- scapegoat. It just won't work and the American media must tine Liberation Organization moved in after King recognize it and cooperate in rejecting bigotries that carry Hussein drove it out of Jordan in September 1970. with them the harm of the ages to an entire nation. Prime Minister Golda Meir warned the Lebanese government that Israel would not countenance a Hate Has Its Antidotes ... new sanctuary for terrorists. Still, Lebanon gave Regrettably Anti-Semites the inch to the PLO and the rest is what we see, the Never Learn the Truth destruction of a nation. The PLO, with leftist Lebanese forces, sacked and pillaged Christian It's offered numerous times as an antidote to anti- cities until Syria, fearing a radical takeover, came Semitism — the record of Jewry's services to mankind. It in and began slaughtering the Palestinians and doesn't do very much good, does it? their cohorts. After the Syrian "peacekeeping" Advice to Jew-baiters has been dished out in many mission had succeeded in putting the PLO under forms, listing the long record of creative activities by Jews in many lands. Because it is repeated, in the form of a its control, Syria and the PLO turned their guns message sent to Ann Landers from Father Ted Hesburgh, on the Christian minority. There are 32,000 Syrian troops in Lebanon and president of the University of Notre Dame, it merits repeat- at least three times that many Arabs have died in ing. It was written by the late humorist Sam Levenson: It's a free world. that land in the last decade thanks to these You don't have to like peacemakers and their Palestinian allies. Jews, but if you During this period, successive Israeli govern- don't, I suggest that ments have bombed Palestinian enclaves in you boycott certain Lebanon. Sum up all these Israeli strikes, includ- Jewish products like ing the invasion of Lebanon in 1978, including the insulin, discovered bombing of Beirut, and still the casualties in- by Dr. Minkoski; the flicted by Israel are miniscule next to what the vaccine for hepatitis, "Arab nation" has done to its own people. The discovered by world hardly took note. When more than 90,000 Baruch Blumberg; Arabs die by Arab guns and bombs, it's just one of chlorhydrate for those crazy things. When 300 Arabs die by Israeli convulsions, dis- fire, it's a Holocaust committed by a Jewish Mad covered by Dr. J. Von Bomber. Begin. It begins with Begin. Read the Liebig; the Wasser papers, watch the television. man test for syphili Mr. Zion then deals with the situation involving Jor- SAM LEVENSON streptomycin, dis- dan. He calls attention to Jordan having been the name of a covered by Dr. Sel- river until Winston Churchill in 1922, as British Colonial man Abraham Waxman; the polio pill by Dr. A. Secretary, turned the river's east bank into the Emirate of Sabin, and the polio vaccine by Dr. Jonas Salk. Transjordan. He emphasizes that Transjordan is 80 percent Good! Boycott! But humanitarianism requires of the land mass of Palestine. Mr. Zion emphasizes: "Trans- that my people offer all these gifts to all the people jordan IS Palestinian," the name having been changed in of the world. Fanaticism requires that all bigots 1948 from Transjordan into the Hashemite Kingdom of accept diabetes, hepatitis, convulsions, syphilis, Jordan, and he comments: "Presto! The ancient Hashemite infectious diseases and infantile paralysis. Kingdom of Jordan. So what? So everything. What was in You want to be mad? Be mad! But I'm telling every respect Palestine became a refugee camp for Palesti- you, you ain't going to feel so good. nian Arabs, a host country for those 'driven out' by the It doesn't help much to repeat it. It isn't because the Jews. And so it is viewed today. The Hussein family, brought out of Arabia by Churchill, are the only truly anti-Semites are all bone-heads, -but because their hatred is non-Palestinians living in Jordan today. Yet the world sees deeper than their common sense. That's why the liberals like Fr. Hesburgh keep reminding the unknowledgeable. Palestine as wherever the Jews live." The expose of the Jordanian position in the Middle The Levenson message must sink in somewhere. .