THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS
2 Friday, May 1, 1982
Purely Commentary
Two Women of Valor — Charlotte Jacobson and Jeane
Kirkpatrick — and Their Related Campaigns Against
Bigotry and Injustice in the Media and at the UN
The Libertarian Struggle
an Uphill
on Two Fronts
Battle to Attain Justice
...
Two women figure valiantly in the struggle for fair
play and to eradicate bigotry. Their roles are related. One
has risen to challenge untruth in media communications.
The other has thrown the gauntlet to the hate-mongering
forces in the United Nations. Charlotte Jacobson and Jeane
Kirkpatrick emerge among the most courageous in the
current libertarian struggles.
Jeane Kirkpatrick had much to contend with since her
appointment as chief U.S. delegate to the United Nations.
The problems are as numerous as the nations sharing
membership in the UN.
Major on the problematic agenda of the UN is the
Middle East, and it takes courage to confront the venom-
ous, repetitive manifestations aimed at destroying one of
the member nations. Mrs. Kirkpatrick tackled the issues
with so much courage that her role will go down on record
as the most dramatic in statesmanship.
Equally challenging is the manner in which the media
have been treating the same issues, and the head of the
American section of the Jewish Agency and the World
Zionist Organization, as well as president of Jewish.. Na-
tional Fund, Charlotte Jacobson, emerges as a valorous
defender of Jewish rights in that sphere.
Mrs. Jacobson expressed the sense of outrage over the
biased reporting on events in Israel by ABC News. The
earlier "20/20" program was followed by the equally-biased
ABC "Fortress Israel" program. Whereupon she found it
necessary to write to the president of ABC News, Roone
Arledge, in these harsh terms:
My hope for "20/20" vision in this the second
time around for an ABC-TV program devoted to
the sensitive area of Israel was rudely shattered
by last night's (April 22) "Fortress Israel."
Once again your myopic and blind-spotted,
camera completely omitted scenes that demon-
strate the fact that Israel's ideals of human rights,
Jewish cultural and spiritual revitalization and
political and economic self-determination are a
living reality, despite her struggle for existence.
Your viewers were not given the slightest
glimpse of the normal, vibrant and pulsating life
of Israel whose people pursue their daily tasks
calmly and efficiently without hindrance in a free
society; whose children go to school no differently
than their peers in the Western democracies;
whose creative and performing artists and
writers are involved in producing a vital throb-
bing cultural renaissance; whose people are dedi-
cated to peace, to human dignity and to democ-
racy's and Judaism's finest ideals.
I would have thought you would want to bal-
ance your previous deplorably pro-PLO program
this time. Instead, you have added insult to injury.
In consequence, I and many other viewers will
turn to other channels for the objective coverage
which can no longer be had from the biased re-
porting of ABC-TV.
I cannot imagine that your advertisers can be
happy at the fact that it has become impossible for
so many of their prospective consumers to con-
tinue to watch ABC-TV, and who in their dismay
and indeed, outrage at your blatant anti-Israel,
bias, will turn away from their products in pro-
test.
It is most regrettable that it should have come to such a
state of affairs that a top Jewish leader should be castigat-
ing a news agency. But that's what has developed in the
course of Israel's defensive position not only in Israel proper
but also on the American scene. The regrettable fact is that
ABC is not alone as a distorter of fact and as a spreader of
bias against Israel. There was a similar program a few days
after "Fortress Israel" on NBC News, and now the Saudi
Arabia programs on Channel 56 multiply the bias, adding
insult to injury.
There is an explanatory piece related to this aggra-
vated matter in the current issue of the ADL Bulletin.
Dealing with charges of bias against the New York Times
in its handling of news reports from Israel and Lebanon,
there is a portion, "New York Times Responds," stating:
To its credit, the Times responded on Feb. 17,
reporting the furor in Israel about an alleged
"cover-ifp" and including the previously deleted
paragraph concerning the detention of its report-
ers in Lebanon.
The story container an explanation by Craig
Whitney, the Times' deputy foreign editor, on why
the incident had not been reported at the time it
occurred:
"The correspondents were detained until they
could identify themselves the next day when they
were freed. It is the policy of the Times to report
difficulties encountered by its correspondents in
the course of reporting only when the difficulties
themselves become news, and we did not consider
CHARLOTTE JACOBSON
JEANE EIREPATRICK
this such a case, then or now."
The Israeli response was swift. "This state-
ment," said Mr. (Zev) Chafets (director of the
press information office for the Israeli govern-
ment), "ignored the fact that the Times often re-
ported difficulties encountered by correspon-
dents, even when these difficulties can in no way
be construed as news."
As examples, he cited a story printed in the
Times on May 29, 1979, by . Youssef M. Ibrahim,
then a Times correspondent, detailing his deten-
tion for five hours at the Allenby Bridge by Israeli
authorities as he was entering the country from
Jordan. Mr. Ibrahim acknowledged in the article
that he was carrying tapes of conversations with
leaders of the PLO and a letter of introduction
fi=om the PLO's Beirut office to its Damascus
office.
On Dec. 8, 1980, the Times published a story by
its Israel correspondent, David Shipler, featuring
the detention for seven hours of a UPI reporter by
the Israeli military authorities for entering a
closed military zone while covering disturbances
at Bir Zeit University in the West Bank.
"Neither of these incidents," said Mr. Chafets,
"were remotely comparable in seriousness to the
detention and intimdation of five senior Ameri-
can correspondents by the PLO in Lebanon."
Mr. Chafets has voiced the feeling of many Is-
raelis that the Western press employs a double
standard of reporting news, one out of the Arab
capitals and the other for Israel.
An editorial in the Jerusalem Post, the English
language daily known for its critical stance
toward the Begin government, boldly stated that
"in reporting about Israel and especially the
problems on the West Bank, they (the foreign
press) have exploited Israel's open society to sav-
age it. But in writing about Arab states, they have
accepted the restraints of despotism, and in re-
porting from Beirut, they have submitted to the
parameters dictated by terror."
* * *
Now comes the story of Jeane Kirkpatrick and her
firmness in treating the inanities — and stupidities! — at
the UN.
The Arabs were Mobilizing forces for adoption of a
resolution calling for Israel's expulsion from the world
organization. They withdrew it on April 27, the day on
which its adoption was scheduled, and instead the UN
General Assembly passed a condemnatory statement cal-
ling Israel an enemy of peace.
Israel's chief delegate to
the UN, Yehuda Z. Blum,
described those who voted
for the resolution as: "Moral
perverts, intellectual
dwarfs, unprincipled cynics
and bigots . . . (who) fan
the flames of religious
hatred of the United Na-
tions."
And the so-called pro-
gressive and democratic
Western nations often ally
themselves with those who
drag the world organization
YEHUDA BLUM
into the gutter!
It is reasonable to believe that the reason the origi-
nally-planned resolution was withdrawn was because
on the previous Friday, on April 23, Mrs. Kilpatrick deliv-
ered an address in which the bigotry was condemned and in
which the U.S. delegate warned of the impending conse-
quences to the UN if such a resolution were approved,
declaring:
This special session and its accompanying draft
resolutions are one more clear example of a
strategy whose goals and tactics are clear: use a
United Nations body to make "official" demands
incompatible with Israel's security and survival,
By Phil
Slomovi
so as then to be able to complain that non-
compliance with these impossible demands "pro-
ves" Israel an international lawbreaker — un-
worthy of membership in the international corn-
munity of peaceloving states. ---
Mr. President, if this organization established
to seek, maintain and strengthen peace is used to
make war by other means; if its avenues, estab-
lished to provide a rational basis for discussion
and settlement of international disputes, are used
as battlefields in a holy war; if its procedures,
designed to ensure fairness, are twisted to ensure
desired political outcomes — then the purposes
and structures of this organization are trans-
formed. And the United Nations itself is trans-
formed. It becomes, quite literally, a different
organization, inspired by different purposes,
dedicated to different goals, characterized by
different modes of behavior; for an institution s,
finally, nothing more or less than the regult
teractions of its members.
When the goals and behavior of the members
change, the institution has changed as well.
Mr. President, how much falsification can an
institution stand without destroying itself
entirely? This world body cannot endure as a
moral and political force if its energies are de-
voted to increasing conflict and conducting ven-
dettas against targeted countries.
If the United Nations prefers to make political
war rather than peace, it must suffer the conse-
quences in terms of its credibility and reputation.
And if, in violation of its own rules, it should de-
cide to exclude the democratic state of Israel from
participation, it will inevitably reap the
whirlwind.
It is not too late, Mr. President, for a majority of
member states to reverse the trend toward irres-
ponsibility and destruction. The time to begin is
now, before this trend gathers an irreversible
momentum.
The American people should bless the day President
Ronald Reagan selected Jeane Kirkpatrick to speak for this
nation at the UN. She helps keep this country on the side of
reason and justice and she earns gratitude for firmness
and courage. Thanks to her at least one nation resists the
threats and the infaMy to which the rest of the world is
bowing.
Bigotry on the Home Front:
Shocking Detroit News Hate-Editorial
American newspapers have blundered on numerous
occasions in their treatment of Israel, especially when,
searching for excuses for hate-mongering — this is what it
often amounts to! — they keep harping on their scapegoat,
Menahem Begin.
The Detroit News, on April 28, sank to the lowest level.
The manner in which it impugned the Begin role as if he
were the world's chief villain responsible for the occur-
rences in the Middle East, glorified shop-worn contentions
that if he were ousted all problems.would be solved.
These are not the words of that outrageous editorial,
but they certainly represent the sense of it. A Detroit News
editorial writer stupidly suggests getting rid of the Israeli
prime minister, as if Detroiters were casting the ballots.
The lack of respect for the Israel constituency which elects
its prime minister must be condemned as an outrageous
assumption of the right to poison popular thinking. It is
useless to suggest to such a writer that he look at the record,
that he learn that Begin speaks the minds of the over-
whelming majority of Israelis, that the vicious attacks
upon him help solidify appreciation of his efforts in Ameri-
can Jewish ranks.
Is it too much to expect that editorial writers study the
facts and refrain from spreading hatred with distorted
judgments?
No Sanction to Arsonists:
JARC Honors Responsibilities
Responsible leaders who are administering the activi-
ties of the Jewish Association for Retarded Citizens acted
promptly and realistically at a specially-convened mee
of officers and members of the administrative board so
25 hours after the newly-planned home for retarded was set
afire. The firm decision was to proceed with plans and to
operate the home as originally planned. It won't commence
on June 1, and the damage to the home will necessitate a
month's postponement. But the home will function.
It was the American and. Jewish way of stating to the
evil minds that they can't dehumanize society, that the less
fortunate will not be abandoned, that the dedication to a
sacred cause will not be interrupted.
Thus, bigotry and arson will not be sanctioned.
Let the sad experience at the planned home for the
retarded in Pleasant Ridge be a signal to the entire com-
munity to mobilize for increased action in support of efforts
to create additional welcoming homes for retarded by
strengthening the work of the JARC.