4 Friday, September27, 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 48076
Telephone (313) 354-6060
PUBLISHER: Charles A. Buerger
EDITOR EMERITUS: Philip Slomovitz
EDITOR: Gary Rosenblatt
BUSINESS MANAGER: Carmi M. Slomovitz
ART DIRECTOR: Kim Muller-Thym
NEWS EDITOR: Alan Hitsky
LOCAL NEWS EDITOR: Heidi Press
EDITORIAL ASSISTANT: Tedd Schneider
LOCAL COLUMNIST: Danny Raskin
ACCOUNT EXECUTIVES:
Lauri Biafore
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
(C) 1985 by The Detroit Jewish News (US PS 275-520)
Second Class postage paid at Southfield. Michigan and additional mailing offices.
Subscriptions: 1 year - $21 — 2 years - $39 — Out of State - $23 — Foreign • $35
CANDLELIGHTING AT 7:01 P.M.
VOL. LXXXVIII, NO. 5
Weir's War
The good news is that Rev. Benjamin Weir is once again a free man,
back in the U.S. after a 16-month ordeal as a hostage in Lebanon. The
bad news is that the media has acted irresponsibly in allowing Weir to
convey his captor's propaganda without questioning his skewered
convey
perspective. Weir says his release is a sign of the "good intentions" of the
terrorists who held him in solitary confinement for a year, and that
statement goes unchallenged. Weir says Israel is an "oppressive,
aggressive, militaristic" country whose lobby in Washington "pretty much
creates U.S. foreign policy" and his statement stands.
It is admirable that Weir maintained his sanity during his
confinement but that does not mean that his views on terrorism, the
Mideast and world diplomacy deserve unquestioned front-page play.
It has become increasingly evident since the hijacking of the TWA
plane in June that the Mideast terrorists are extremely sophisticated in
manipulating the Western media. Their threats and demands are
broadcast on prime time and yet they portray themselves as desperate
underdogs rather than calculating criminals.
Weir was released not for humanitarian reasons but because his
captors hoped he could help publicize their cause in forcing the release of
17 convicted terrorists imprisoned in Kuwait. Tiny Kuwait has held firm
in its refusal to release the men, convicted of a fatal bomb attack in 1983.
How foolish and impotent the U.S. would appear if we were to give in to
the terrorist demands and force Kuwait to comply.
Americans must come to understand that we are at war, that
America is under attack from a worldwide terrorist conspiracy and the
U.S. media must accept part of the responsibility for the terrorists'
success. As Michael Novak, the author and commentator, has noted:
"American sentimentality must be shattered. The depiction of the
families' anguish must not deter us from going to causes, not symptoms."
He adds that the point is not to sentimentalize our enemies but defeat
them.
Let us rejoice in Benjamin Weir's safe return but his message
reminds us that the terrorist war goes on. And we are losing.
True Peace?
King Hussein of Jordan and President Mubarak of Egypt met in
Cairo last week for talks on their "peace drive" before their separate vis-
its to Washington later this month. The two men have emphasized talks
between the U.S. and a Jordanian-Palestinian Arab delegation. But such
talks would bypass Israel, and the point must be made that peace needs
to be established between Israel and the Arabs, not between the U.S. and
the Arabs.
Israel is ready to meet with Hussein and non-PLO representatives at
any time and at any place, without prior conditions. Both the U.S. and Is-
rael remain convinced that only direct talks between the governm'ents of
the countries at war can resolve the conflict. In contrast, Jordan and
other Arab governments continue to call for an international' conference
with the full participation of the Soviets and the PLO, the . two most seri-
ous antagonists to Mideast peace.
OP-ED
Ethiopians And The Rabbis:
A Study Of Two Paradoxes
BY IRVING GREENBERG
Special to The Jewish News
Operation Moses, the airlift of
thousands of Ethiopian Jews to Is-
rael, filled world Jewry with reli-
gious exhiliration, like a new
Exodus. It was therefore jarring to
learn that the Chief Rabbinate of Is-
rael was requiring Ethiopian Jews to
undergo ritual "conversion" as if
they had to establish their status as
Jews, after all.
Initially, the rabbinate justified
the conversion requirements as a
stringency (l'humra) applied to any-
one of questionable Jewish status so
as to remove any possible challenge
to their identity as Jews. But Ethio-
pian Jewry's status has been upheld
in the halakhic literature since the
Sixteenth Century. After much criti-
cism (including Prime Minister Shi-
mon Peres' intervention), the rabbi-
nate dropped its demands for sym-
bolic circumcision, explaining that
circumcisions performed in Ethiopia
were valid and acceptable.
The immersion requirement was
sustained, however, justified by some
who 'argue that over the centuries,
non-Jews may have married into the
Ethiopian community, bearing non-
Jewish offspring. Others hold that
the Beta Israel -(as the Ethiopian
Jews call themselves) lacked the
competence to do divorces (gittin) ac-
cording to rabbinic law. Therefore,
there might be illegitimate children
(mamzerim from second marriages.
Being considered non-Jews and un-
dergoing conversion would free
Ethiopian Jews of such a "taint" be-
cause non-Jews do not need gittin to
dissolve their marriages, not being
bound by Jewish law.
However, the strict religious be-
havior of the Beta Israel, their
Rabbi Greenberg is president of CLAL:
The National Jewish Center for
Learning and Leadership.
well-nigh non-existent divorce rate,
and their outsider status in Ethio-
pian society make intermarriage and
illegitimacy highly unlikely. Fur-
thermore, the former Chief Rabbis
(Ovadia Yosef and Shlomo Goren)
averred publicly that the Ethiopians
were fully Jewish and needed no
ritual — immersion, circumcision, or
The insulation of the
Israel rabbinate from
popular value and choice
has allowed the Eastern
European yeshiva world
to impose its values . . .
otherwise. (This was a landmark rul-
ing, for it helped turn the tide and
paved the way for Menachem Be-
gin's reversal of governmental policy
toward bringing the Ethiopians
home.)
Why then have the current rab-
bis inflicted this requirement on
Ethiopian Jews? After all, the rab-
binate's record on the issue is at
least as good as that of its American
critics.
The rabbinate's performance on
the ingathering of Ethiopian Jewry
is one more unfortunate result of the
growing establishment of religion in
Israel. The rabbiniate is •insulated
from society and from constituency
groups. It does, however, remain
subject to the peer pressure of the
world of yeshiva learning and the
judgment of right-wing Orthodoxy
which is skeptical of all conversion
and is constantly pressuring for
"stricter" rulings. •
The rabbinate is more sensitive
to its traditionalist critics than it is
Continued on Page 12