4 Friday, August 30, 1985 THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS THE JEWISH NEWS Serving Detroit's Metropolitan Jewish Community with distinction for four decades. Editorial and Sales offices at 20300 Civic Center Dr., Suite 240, Southfield, Michigan 4076 Telephone (313) 354-6060 PUBLISHER: Charles A. Buerger EDITOR EMERITUS: Philip Slomovaz EDITOR - Gary Rosenblatt BUSINESS MANAGER: Cam M. Slomovaz ART DIRECTOR: Kim Muller-Thym NEWS EDITOR: Alan Hasky LOCAL NEWS EDITOR: Heidi Press EDITORIAL ASSISTANT: Tedd Schneider LOCAL COLUMNIST Danny Raskin ACCOUNT EXECUTIVES: Lauri Biaf ore Allan Craig Rick Nessel Danny Raskin OFFICE STAFF: Marlene Miller Dharlene Norris Phyllis Tyner Pauline Weiss Ellen Wolfe PRODUCTION: Donald Cheshure Cathy Ciccone Curtis Deloye Ralph Orme I gEJS by The Dvirrol Jo.wish News (US PS 2 1 `i - ' ,2 0, Second Class postage paid al Southfield Michigan and additional (nailing ottices Foreign $3$ Oul of Stale • $23 I year - $2 I -- 2 years • $39 Subscriptions 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 64#4i0a ttr