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Friday, December 14, 1984

THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS

PURELY COMMENTARY

PHILIP SLOMOVITZ

Unemployment in Israel:
The newest development -
with drastic challenges

Rivlin

Jacobson

Even during the most depressing eco-
nomic difficulties, Israel was able to boast
a full employment record. Now comes a
reversal which will, hopefully, be short-
lived.
The revelation that there are now
100,000 unemployed in Israel is cause for
serious concern. It lends realism to appeals
that have been heard in recent weeks for
increased support for the oldest of the
Zionist fundraising agencies, the Keren
Kayemet — Jewish National Fund.
In their appeals for increased support
to uphold the hands of the management of
the land-redeeming and forest-planting
agency, Moshe Rivlin, the world president,
and Charlotte Jacobson, the president of
the Jewish National Fund of America, give
emphasis to a basic factor in their aims:
that Keren Kayemet-JNF is the largest
employer of labor in Israel. This has not
been disputed, because the many purposes
in land redemption, tree planting and road
building, all JNF duties, require many
hands to accomplish tasks recognized as
vital to state building and protecting.
While it is urgent that the communal
responsibility to reduce multiplicity of
fundraising campaigns must be im-
plemented, there are some causes that can
not be ignored. Hadassah's health-
assuring program is always treated with
respect. The vitality of Magen David
Adorn, Israel's equivalent of the Red Cross,
is definitely established. Karen
Kayemet-JNF has a task on behalf of
Jewry. That task must be assured and ef-
forts on its behalf redoubled. It is the one
way of aiding Israel in fighting her eco-
nomic ills, and reducing the country's un-
employment.

Prof. Bernard Goldman
enhanced the publishing
of Jewish-content books

Bernard Goldmtzti returns to teaching.

Resumption by Dr. Bernard Goldman
of full-time responsibility on the faculty of
Wayne State University will reassure the
authoritative commitments to the Art De-
partment to which he had already made
important contributions. His abandon-
ment of the chairmanship of Wayne State
University Press is accompanied by the
hope that the standards he raised in that
duty will continue.
In the ten years Prof. Goldman de-
voted to guiding the destinies of WSU
Press, he gave encouragement to authors
of note. The selection of books produced
under his tittection served as encourage-
ment to other university publishing aims
on a national scale.
The Jewish book shelf was especially
enriched in the directions that were pro-
vided to readers of submitted documents,
in the endorsements Dr. Goldman gave to
important classics. It is in the faith he
created in proper translations from many
languages as well as important originals
that he gave impetus to commendable book
publishing.
The translations from the Hebrew and
Yiddish, resulting in the issuance of im-
portant volumes with the aid of the Enima
and Morris Schaver Fund which came into
being thanks to Dr. Goldman's organiza-
tional skills, have retained great interest
in the Jewishly-topiced works.
That's how the nationally-acclaimed
reputation for genuine skill in the publish-
ing sphere has been well earned and im-
pressively established.

Armand Hammer may help
drill for oil in Israel

Armand Hammer:
Planning oil drilling in Israel.

The current issue of Business Week
has an interesting revelation for the hope-
ful in Israel, and it involves the famous
86-year-old curmudgeon Armand Ham-
mer.
He is famous for the rich contacts he
has with the Soviet Union, and he has
made some interesting, friendly comments
on Israel in recent years. None, however,
matches the revelation in the Dec. 19 issue
of Business Week.
Hammer was honored by the Israel
Bond Organization in Los Angeles and he
used the occasion to make a personal $1
million purchase. But he did much more to
arouse the appetite of Israelis who have
been hoping that something akin to Saudi
Arabia's great fortunes may happen to Is-
rael: discovery of oil.
So, at that Israel Bond dinner, Ham-
mer suggested the possibility of becoming
an oil driller in Israel. While denying that
Occidential Petroleum Corp. is involved in
such a plan, he said he might invest $1
million in such a project. Was it a state-
ment "off the top of his head"? There was
the added manipulated suggestion that the
$1 million would be "a good tax shelter."
Business Week declared that "the Is-

raelis are running with the ball." It has
also been announced that Hammer will re-
turn to Israel in January to get the project
moving.
Business Week's revealing article
about Hammer's interest in oil from Israel
adds that the projected* syndicate will
negotiate a $10 million investment in oil
exploration in 1985. Apparently, this is not
a dream. Business Week states that Israel
Energy Minister Moshe Shahal has made
known that Hammer has asked for explo-
ration rights in a specific Israel area —
"not in the occupied territories" — with the
ministry currently assessing the plan.
In this connection, some Business
Week facts are worth quoting. Hammer

told the Israel Bond leaders at the dinner
honoring him that only 300 prospective
wells have been sunk in Israel since 1948
— in contrast to the 5,000 sunk in the al
United States last year alone.
There is the prevailing view that Is-
rael does have oil but that deep drilling
will be necessary. There is also the prevail-
ing view that prospective investors shied
away from oil drilling in Israel due to Arab
pressures.
Therefore, the leadership of Armand
Hammer may solve a hitherto oppressive
interference with oil prospecting in Israel.
The Hammer name arouses many hopes
and it may prove a great blessing for the
Jewish state.

I

Panoramic summary of Jewish
experience in scholarly 'Atlas'

Prof. Nicholas deLange, University of
Cambridge lecturer in rabbinics, renders a
notable service with his A tlas of the Jewish
World, published in Oxford, England and
distributed in this country by Facts on File,
Inc., 240 Park Ave. S., New York 10016.
A large-sized volume, its 240 pages
compress the facts incorporating the his-
torical and cultural backgrounds of Jewish
recorded history, continuing into an im-
pressive study of the Jewish people in this
era.
"Atlas" is a term well applied to this
volume because of its coverage, even if only
in summation, of the basics of Jewish ex-
perience.
Taking into account the eras covering
both the Christian and Islamic applica-
tions to the occurrences which marked
Jewish historical records in olden times,
Dr. deLange introduces the basics needdd
for a knowledge of history.
The Sephardic as well as the
Ashkenazic Dia.sporas receive thorough
reviews.
These led toward modern occurrences.
with emphasis on the last 100 years. The
author's analysis of the golden years of the
era of Emancipation, followed by the
brutal reversals culminating in the
Holocaust, provide the vital data of the
century.
Updated, taking into account the
latest events in thd Lebanese military ac-
tivities aimed at preventing increasing
PLO threats to Israel, Dr. deLange, who
has lived for a number of years in Israel,
places emphasis on the Jewish state's inf-
luential role in the historical develop-
ments of battling against the prejudice and
striving for libertarian achievements.
Thus, the bitter is interlinked with the
creative. Religious and cultural aspects
are provided authoritative consideration
by the author, who had important roles in
Jewish communal affairs and in
Christian-Jewish dialogues.
The current experiences receive
noteworthy attention in the consideration
of the present status of the Jews in the
world today. Dr. deLange provides special
attention in his review of the Jewish popu-
lation figures. In the main, studying the
distribution of Jews on a worldwide basis,
he points out:
Most Jews in the world are
concentrated in a few countries.
Three — the United States, Israel
and the Soviet Union — account
between them for over 80 percent
of the total, and the nine largest
communities (those estimated at
over 100,000 members each) consti-
tute probably as much as 95 per-
cent of world Jewry.
Another way of hooking at the
figures is in terms of the ratio of
Jews to the total population. Here,
on a national basis, Israel is totally

Holocaust memorial in Johannesburg.

exceptional, with Jews constitut-
ing nearly 85 percent of the popu-
lation (excluding the administered
territories). Only five other coun-
tries (United States, Gibraltar,
Uruguay, Canada and France)
have ten or more Jews per 1,000
inhabitants. In all other countries
the Jews are numerically insig-
nificant.
According to the most accept-
able estimates, there are about 13
million Jews in the world today.
Half of them live in the Americas,
and about a quarter each in
Europe and Asia (mainly in Israel).
Well over half the Jews live in
English-speaking countries. Mi-
gration, after the massive upheav-
als of the past century, now seems
relatively stable. Recent years
have seen some emigration from
countries where political condi-
tions are not propitious (such as
Afghanistan, Iran and Zimbabwe)
and continuous movement into
and out of Israel. The only really
momentous net emigration has
been from the Soviet Union. About
250,000 Jews left in the 1970s. This
movement has now been virtually
halted, but it is known that consid-
erable numbers of Jews have
applied for exit permits, or would
apply in more favorable circum-
stances.
Urbanization as a marked trend in
Jewish ranks is defined in this interesting .
Atlas.
DeLange's portrayals of eminent lead-
ers is a valuable element in this Atlas of
history. Replete with maps and chronolog-
ical data, with scores of colorful photo-
graphs, it is illustratively enriching.
Dr. deLange's studies invite a deep
interest in his summations. His Atlas adds
immensely to Jewish scholarly studies of
the Diaspora, with notable emphases also
.on Israel's redeemed statehood.

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