THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS Friday, September 13, 1985
YEAR IN REVIEW 5745 YEAR IN REVIEW
Continued from Page 41
FATE OF THE HOSTAGES of a TWA flight from Athens
was in limbo for several weeks as Shi'ite terrorists (right)
kept the passengers in Beirut before finally releasing them.
One American was killed. The terrorists went unpunished.
ATTACKS IN ISRAEL and against Israeli troops in south Lebanon were a problem
of major proportions this year, turning many Israelis to the right in search of more
militant solutions.
TERRORIS
ceremony, he pleaded face to face with the
President prior to the trip not to visit Bit-
burg because it is "not your place." Most
disturbing was the President's failure to
distinguish between the millions of Jewish
men, women and children — martyrs re-
duced to ashes — and the SS soldiers buried
at Bitburg. He equated them all as "vic-
tims" and seemed, in so doing, to attempt to
undo history.
Painful memories of the Holocaust,
stirred by Bitburg and observances of the
40th anniversary of the liberation of the
death camps, were jolted anew by reports
about the notorious Nazi doctor, Joseph,
Mengele. First, that he was alive in
Paraguay; later that he had drowned five
years ago in Brazil. Even as Nazi hunters
and medical experts agreed that the body in
question in a small Brazilian cemetery was
indeed Mengele's, anger and frustration
grew in the realization that the evil "Angel
of Death" would never be brought to trial to
face judgement for his heinous crimes
against humanity.
One trial that did take place pitted Is-
raeli General Ariel Shimon vs. Time maga-
zine in a New York City courtroom this
winter. Sharon maintained that a Time ar-
ticle had libeled him, suggesting that he
helped plan the 1982 massacre by Phalan-
gists of Palestinian refugees at the Sabra
and Sha ilia camps in Beirut. At issue was
really Is ael's image in the press and the
way bias emerges in the media. The result
of the lengthy trial found both sides claim-
ing victory. Time was not guilty of libel,
but its report on Sharon was found to be
false and defamatory; legally, Time won but
Sharon clearly won a moral victory.
Around the world the death of Cher-
nenko and the succession of Gorbachev in
Moscow did not improve the fate of Soviet
Jews, who face continuous oppression and
whose emigration to the West has virtually
ended. In South Africa, the Jewish commu-
nity continues to oppose apartheid, as riot-
ing among blacks these last months has
brought the nation ever closer to full-scale
civil war.
Here in Detroit, major highlights of the
year included the opening of Holocaust
Memorial Center in West Bloomfield and
the highly-attended and acclaimed "Preci-
ous Legacy" exhibit at the Detroit Institute
of Arts. Both served as a reminder of our
lost heritage, and as a counterpoint to the
Bitburg and Mengele affairs.
For all of the painful memories of the
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