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Friday, August 30, 1985
THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS
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CANDLELIGHTING AT 7:53 P.M.
VOL. LXXXVIII, NO. 1
Proving The Holocaust
So now it's official: a Los Angeles court has determined that the
Holocaust did indeed happen. A six-year legal battle ended recently when
a Holocaust survivor won $100,000 and an unprecedented apology from
an organization called the Institute for Historical Review, which had
offered a $50,000 reward to anyone who could prove that the Nazis gassed
Jews to death. Mel Mermelstein, now 58, a businessman from Long
Beach, Cal. whose mother and two sisters were gassed at Auschwitz,
provided the Institute with a long list of evidence including declarations
by 13 Auschwitz eyewitnesses. When his evidence was rejected,
Mermelstein went to court.
His victory should send a message to the obscene revisionists around
the World who claim the Holocaust was a Zionist-inspired hoax. And the
message is that the Big Lie cannot stand up in a court of law and that
attempts to distort history will be countered with the awesome power of
the truth.
A Fragile Wall?
A shiver went down the spines of Republican strategists as word
spread that Christian television evangelist Pat Robertson might run for
the GOP 1988 Presidentia4 nomination. With competition from
front-runners Vice President George Bush and Representative Jack
Kemp, hardly anyone expects Robertson to cop the nomination. But just
the idea of Robertson throwing his clerical hat into the ring has thrown
the GOP into a tizzy. Robertson has a donor base as large as that of the
Republican National Committee, his own television network and an
enthusiastic following for his fervid evangelism. He just might be able to
garner enough delegates to the 1988 Republican convention to act as a
power broker.
But even more troubling to Democrats, Republicans, independents,
gentiles, Jews and non-believers should be the growing influence of the
fundamentalist right in politics. In the last few years, fundamentalism
has attracted voters and support for candidates, mostly from the
Republican party. One recent survey indicates that 81 percent of white
born-again Protestants voted for Ronald Reagan in 1984 and that 77
percent cast their ballots for GOP congressional candidates that same
year. The ability of fundamentalists to elect candidates who agree with
their hard-line positions on abortion, sexuality and the teaching of
evolution should not be discounted.
With Robertson seriously considering a run at the presidency, the
role of the fundamentalist right has taken a giant step. The anxiety that
his possible candidacy has produced among mainstream Republicans is a
clear sign of the power that fundamentalists now wield in electoral
politics. It is also a troubling indication that the traditional wall between
church and state in American politics may be more fragile than most
Americans are willing to admit.
OP-ED
Vatican Fears Reprisals
For Dealings With Israel
BY MARC H. TANENBAUM
Special to The Jewish News
Expectations that Pope John
Paul II will visit Israel or that for-
mal diplomatic relations will be es-
tablished between the Holy See and
Israel are not in the cards. Not in
the near future.
First, contrary to public percep-
tions, the Vatican maintains de facto
recognition of the State of Israel.
When Israel's Prime Minister Shi-
mon Peres met with the Pope in
February he was given red carpet
treatment, the full protocol accorded
a head of state. That has been true
of the diplomatic visits made to the
Vatican earlier by such Israeli gov-
ernmental leaders as Foreign Minis-
ter Yitzhak Shamir, the late Golda
Meir and Moshe Dayan, Abba Eban,
among others.
On a day-to-day basis, the Israel
Embassy in Rome is in regular
communications with the Vatican
Secretariat of State and other Curial
officials. On a cultural level, hun-
dreds of Catholic priests and nuns —
with Vatican approval — study reg-
ularly in Israel.
Second, Pope John Paul II, I am
persuaded, is personally friendly
toward Israel and acknowledges her
right to exist as a sovereign nation.
In a little-noticed Apostolic Letter
issued by the Pope last Easter,
entitled, Redemptionis Anno, he
wrote:
"For the Jewish people who live
in the State of Israel, and who
preserve in that land such precious
testimonies to their history and their
faith, we must ask for the desired
security and the due tranquility that
is the prerogative of every nation
and condition of life and of progress
for every society ...
Rabbi Tanenbaum, director of
international relations of the American
Jewish Committee, is an authority on
Vatican-Jewish relations. He was the
only rabbi present at Vatican Council II,
and recently participated in an audience
with Pope John Paul II.
•
1776
•
"Jews ardently love he
(Jerusalem), and in every age venei:
ate her memory, abundant as she
in many remains and monumenti
from the time of David who chogt
her as the capital, and of Solomoi
who built the Temple there. Ther4;_
fore, they turn their minds to he*.
daily, one may say, and point to heti:
as the sign of their nation."
Pope John Paul II:
No change in relations
Those are the most forthcomii
acknowledgements of the centrali
of Israel and of Jerusalem in Jewi
consciousness made by any Pope
recent memory.
Third, when our AJCommitt
delegation asked of Vatican Sec
tary of State authorities why t
Holy See does not establish de ju
diplomatic relations with Israel,
were given at first the usual exp
nations. "It is not the policy of t
Holy See to enter into diplomatic
lations with a nation when it is in
state of belligerency with
neighbors, or when its borders
not established by internation
agreements. That is why the H
See does not maintain diplomatic
lations with Jordan as well,"
were told.
Continued on Page 33
1985
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