PURELY COMMENTARY

Message Of Passover

Continued from. Page 2

Several experiences repeat them-
selves. Passover is a time to call at-
tention to the outrage culminating
from non-Jewish bigotries in the
spreading of the ritual murder libel.
Just as one such occurrence, the
Damascus Blood Libel, encouraged
the protest of Heinrich Heine for his
return to Judaism, so must every Jew
show his contempt every time the
libel is mentioned.
Then there is the spreading of the
nefarious Protocols and their copying
even by writers in Japan. The protest
must be endless. Most important is
that the concern over such repetitious
hatemongering should find a proper
and timely expression of shame and
outrage. It is good to know that
Christians often take the lead to do
the condemning.
Jews are often among the guilty
in contributing toward corruption of
truth, misrepresenting facts, creating'
canards. There is an element in the
Soviet Union that is not content with
expressing loyalty to their govern-
ment as means of showing disap-
proval of their Jewish fellow citizens
and by means of assailing the Jewish
State of Israel. They are to be re-
spected for national loyalty. Jews are
always loyal to their "motherlands."

Birobidzhan Hoax

Continued from Page 2

population of the province at
30,000, constituting only 25 per-
cent of its total population.
Thus, Birobidzhan never
took up more than 2 percent of
the Jewish population of the
Soviet Union, and the so-called
Jewish autonomous province
never had a Jewish majority ...
In the thirties, a tremendous
purge hit the Jewish population
of Birobidzhan. The local party
leaders, government officials,
and economic functionaries
were removed, arrested, de-
ported ...
A new purge was conducted
after the war, in 1949-50. The
first secretary of the Communist
Party in the province, its second
secretary, the chairman of the
Executive of the Province's
Soviet, two former deputies
from Birobidzhan to the Sup-
reme Soviet in Moscow, and of
course hundreds of minor offi-
cials and simple citizens, were
among the victims. Non-Jewish
Russians were now appointed
to positions formerly held by
the purged Jewish Communists.
The local Yiddish newspaper,
Birobidzhaner Stern, which had
been discontinued and renewed
several times before but never
had a circulation exceeding a
few hundred copies, was once
more closed down and its staff
arrested.
This is a record of crime, a portion
of the Stalinist anti-Semitic horror that
demands recalling. It must be retold to

32

Friday, April 10, 1987

But to use it by becoming tools of the
state to condemn Israel is an attitude
that will not be condoned.
The important factor involved is
the manner in which the very popular
televised Sixty Minutes program re-
sorted to inexcusable exaggerations in
assembling "loyalties" as means of
minimizing the human rights appeals
of the Russian Jewish "refuseniks."
Even worse: that TV program gave
credence to a hoax, to a falsehood

1137
• • • • •

niarn

..• :

Instruct your son ..

called "an autonomous Jewish state in
Birobidzhan." We have presented the
facts and an additional expose of the
hoax will-follow. Will our youth make
it a point to seek acquaintance with
the facts so that such falsehoods
should be fully exposed?
Such are the lessons of the
Passover, the admonitions of the
Haggadah, to ask questions and to re-
spect the answers, to teach the youth
and to learn the truth with them. Can
there be a more glorious way to celeb-
rate the Passover?

prevent distortion of truth as in the
CBS Sixty Minutes canard.
The above, from the U.S. official
records, is a genesis of the Birobidzhan
hoax that was a veritable pogrom. Let
it serve as a demand that CBS correct
its errors and apologize for them.

protectionist legislation. Japan
has violated the principle of
free trade in its support of the
Arab boycott of Israel more
openly than any other major
industrial nation. Japan thus
subverts the system of interna-
tional trade that benefits all na-
tions and puts at a disadvan-
tage nations, like the U.S., that
by law refuse to abet the Arab
boycott.
Japan's attitude toward the
boycott of Israel substantially
differs from that of other West-
ern industrialized states.
Japanese business openly gives
in to pressures by the Arab
boycott authorities to refrain
from economic contacts with Is-
rael. Japanese companies fre-
quently pre-empt such pressure
by voluntarily boycotting Israel.
The government of Japan ref-
rains from condemning the
boycott and is unwilling to do
anything to prevent application
of the Arab boycott in Japan or
to discourage Japanese busi-
ness cooperation with it.
As for imports from Israel,
there is a reluctance among
Japanese importers to purchase
Israeli-made consumer goods
that receive great public expo-
sure. But there is a greater
willingness to buy Israeli cut
diamonds, chemicals and elec-
tronic equipment, all less ex-
posed to the public eye. Even
here Israeli exporters fre-
quently find difficulties.
The boycott is more evident
in Japan's exports to Israel.

Abraham Foxman

Such major Japanese exporters
of consumer durables as the car
manufacturers Toyota and Nis-
san refuse to sell to Israel al-
together. Others, such as Sanyo,
Sharp and National, trade with
Israel indirectly. It is not un-
common for Japanese com-
panies approached by potential
Israeli customers to inform
them openly that they are un-
able to supply the desired items.
Japan's endorsement of and coop-
eration in the anti-Israel boycott adds
to the injuries committed in the publi-
cation of the copied Protocols bigotries.
Perhaps the latter, newest resort to
anti-Semitism, will awaken a spark of
guilt and will induce Japan to abandon
the anti-Israel policies. Is this an unat-
tainable hope?

Japanese Government
Adds To Anti-Semitism
With Anti-Israel Role

Mimicking the anti-Semites is an
evil in itself. Copying the atrocious fal-
sifications in the Protocols of the Elders
of Zion is a shock to every element of
decency. This is what is happening in
Japan where publications with the
same fabrications as the libels in the
Protocols have gained a readership
running into the hundreds of
thousands.
This outrageous development has
just been exposed and the details of the
shameful occurence were shared on this
page with our readers last week.
One would imagine that this could
cause shame and the Japanese gov-
ernment would condemn and repudiate
it. Instead; it remains a partner in an-
other shameful act — that of support-
ing the Arab boycott of Israel. Com-
menting on the exposing of the hate-
spreading towards Israel, which was
revealed in the New York Times and
Newsweek, Abraham H. Foxman, asso-
ciate national director of the Anti-
Defamation League of B'nai B'rith, out-
lined the case against Japan as an
endorser of a bigoted act against Israel
in this letter published in the NY
Times on March 24:
Take free trade, which the
Japanese champion in an at-
tempt to forestall United States

THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS

The 500-year-old Sarajevo, Yugoslavia Haggadah.