THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS
.2r :1
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rfday, April 20,
1- 7
984 31
FOCUS
The Detroit Division
of the
American Committee for the
Continued from. Page 28
ity," he maintains, and to that end he
has proposed a detailed set of steps to
reorganize welfare and unemploy-
ment payments in a unique mixture of
Reaganomics and welfare advocacy.
It didn't matter which party we
ran with in Yavne in 1973," he says,
and it still wouldn't matter today.
The basic issue is power, not ideology.
Political affiliation doesn't necessarily
say much about your political views
any longer. The Labor Alignment in-
cludes many people far more right-
wing than I am."
Politicians such as Shitreet and
Levy represent a new phenomenon in
Israel — the political coming-of-age of
the development towns. Both men rose
to power as local politicians and have
kept a firm hand on their original
power bases. Suddenly, places like
Yavne and Beit Shean matter.
Moreover, both men are considered
moderating forces within the Likud
(Levy was the only Cabinet minister
even to question sending Phalangist
forces into the Sabra and Shatila
camps), and both are pragmatists
without the bitter ideological history
that drove men like Menachem Begin.
Their influence and that of the
other Sephardim like them is rising
fast in the Likud and could change the
party from within.
In Labor, some politicians are
pinning their hopes on former
President Yitzhak Navon as a possible
party leader. They reason that since he
is Sephardic, he will attract voters
back to Labor. But Navon is from the
small Sephardic elite: his family has
lived in Israrel for generations and has
little in common with the experience of
the mass of Sephardic immigrants who
came after 1948.
Moreover, as Menachem Begin
has proved, the vote does not necessar-
ily go according to ethnic lines. If vot-
ers do switch to Labor, it will be be-
cause of the /drastic failure of Likud
economic policies (with inflation in
1983 close to 200 percent), which have
hit hardest at the poorer, Sephardic
sector of the population.
As the importance of the Sephar-
dic vote penetrates the minds of politi-
cians few people can continue to deny
the crisis of ethnic tension in the coun-
try. "You'd have to be blind not to see
social injustice," says Meir Shitreet.
The early signs of attempts to deal
with the problem are appearing: a de-
partment of Sephardic studies has
opened at one university; Sephardic
history is being written into school
books; school integration proceeds, de-
spite opposition by Ashkenazic par-
ents. The focus of attention and power
is gradually shifting, from the kibbut-
zim and the Israel Philharmonic to the
development towns and the haunting
atonalities of Middle Eastern music.
At such a time, overreaction is
perhaps inevitable on both sides. The
ugly violence that ended, in Emil
Grunzweig's murder still haunts the
country. Ashkenazim talk in panicked
voices of primithre mentalities, the
rule of the street, and Levantinization.
As the Sephardim find their voice,
however, Israel will not necessarily
become a Levantine country. Yet
neither can it remain a European one.
Instead, if it can accept being what it is
— a pluralistic country with immense
culture diversity — it could develop a
unique blend of East and West, or
what one Sephardic educator called
"an original Mediterranean Jewish
culture at ease with its being in the
Middle East."
The vital question is: How much
at ease? Would such an Israel be better
able to find peace with its neighbors
than the Ashkenazic-dominated one?
Liberal Ashkenazim cry no. Lib
eral Sephardim say yes.
To judge by the current crop of
Sephardic politicians, the answer de-
pends on the degree to which the mass
of Sephardim can regain a sense of
self-esteem and self-worth. And that
process is only just beginning.
Weizmann Institute of Science
requests the pleasure of your company at a
Dinner Dance honoring
Paul & Marlene Borman
inaugurating the Borman Professorial Chair
in Applied Mathematics
Tuesday evening, -the first of May,
nineteen hundred eighty four, six o'clock p.m.
Hyatt Regency Hotel
Dearborn, Michigan
GENERAL CHAIRMEN
DINNER CHAIRPERSONS
Barton M. Berman
Lois Spector Freeman
Daniel M. Honigman
Julie R. Levy
Robert Sosnick
BLACK TIE
Reprinted with permission from Esquire
magazine, April 1984. Copyright by Lesley
Hazelson.
IPU criticized for linking
Zionism with racism
Milan Italy — The Anti-
Defamation League of B'nai
B'rith European Founda-
tion (ADLEF) has strongly
condemned the Interna-
tional Parliamentary
Union (IPU) for equating
Zionism with racism and
calling for sanctions against
the State of Israel.
The ADL statement was
in response to the IPU reso-
lution passed by an over-
whelming majority in
Geneva, which branded
Zionism together with col-
onialism and apartheid as
forms of racism.
racism surfaced at the
United Nations, it is still
given currency by a promi-
nent international organ-
ization," said Abraham H.
Foxman, ADL's associate
national director and head
of its International Affairs
Division.
He added that "such ef-
forts to delegitimize the
State of Israel can only re-
sult in the delegitimization
of the world bodies in which
they are made." ADLEF
was joined in its statement
by the leadership of the
Milan Jewish community.
"We are shocked and dis-
mayed that ten years after
this canard of Zionism as
There was special concern
in Milan as Italy was the
only Western European
country that actively sup-
ported and voted for the
Iraqi-sponsored resolution.
The measure was carried by
a vote of 677-137, with 241
abstaining.
Foxman said, "It is terri-
bly disturbing that the Ita-
lian representatives, under
the leadership of Italy's
Foreign Minister Guilio
Andreotti, would lend their
voice to such an infamous
declaration."
The ADL group also noted
that such declarations by
international organizations
"aid, abet and legitimize at-
tacks against innocent
Jewish civilians such as
that which took place in Is-
rael."
Couvert: $250
Guest Speaker
Pulitzer Prize Winning
New York Times Columnist
WILLIAM SAFIRE
rob.
THE WEMMANN INSTITUTE OF SCIENCE
R E H OVOT • ISRAEL
`2x1ttil
For Reservations
Please Call
Edie Mittenthal
569-7275
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