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Sanctions Will Not Cure
Apartheid, Says S. African

DAVID HOLZEL

Staff Writer

Banco de Ponce's UJA MasterCard.

Puerto Rico's MasterCard
Gives Credit To The UJA

ELIZABETH KAPLAN

Staff Writer

0 pen that billfold wide and say
"Ooha."
"Ooha" is the Spanish
pronunciation of UJA, the United
Jewish Appeal, which last month
made its first appearance on a
MasterCard issued through the Ban-
co de Ponce of Puerto Rico.
rIbn thousand cards — each bear-
ing a picture of Masada — have been
printed, and are being distributed in
Puerto Rico and the United States.
About 1 percent of the total pur-
chases charged to the card will go
directly to the UJA, according to
David Efron, president of UJA of
Puerto Rico.
The card was Efron's idea. He

noticed that many special interest
groups have their logos on credit
cards, "but get very, very little (pro-
fit) out of it. Usually, their benefits
are minimal compared to those of the
bank."
So Efron approached the Banco de
Ponce, a bank he called a strong Israel
supporter with a history of contribu-
tions to the UJA.
Banco de Ponce also operates 14
branches in New York.
In proposing the MasterCard,
Efron suggested a partnership,
whereby the Banco de Ponce and the
UJA shared profits. The arrangement
also allows the bank to claim as a tax
deduction the funds given to the UJA.
The card's annual fee is $18.
"At first," Efron said, "some peo-

Continued on Page 14

hile South Africa's Jews
oppose their country's apar-
theid policy, they are
against economic sanctions as a lever
for change.
That is the opinion of Mervyn
Smith, senior vice chairman of the
South African Jewish Board of
Deputies, an organization similar to
Detroit's Jewish Community Council.
Smith and seven other South
African Jews attended the Council of
Jewish Federations meeting in New
Orleans last week to present the posi-
tion of the organized South African
Jewish community. Smith and Justice
Ezra Louis Goldstein of South Africa's
Supreme Court came to Detroit Mon-
day to carry their message farther.
Economic sanctions have been
championed by anti-apartheid ac-
tivists as a way to isolate South
Africa and pressure it to abandon its
racial separation policy and transfer
power to the country's black majority.
Sanctions will not achieve those
goals, Smith said, because South
Africa will find a way to circumvent
them. He urged American Jews to op-
pose U.S. sanctions against South
Africa.
"Sanctions will create an
economic wasteland in which the ma-
jor sufferers will be the blacks," he
said.
Smith called for increased outside
investment in South Africa's economy.
"This will create a larger black
middle class, powerful black trade
unions, and will put enormous

pressure on the whites through the
upward mobility of the blacks."
Most of South Africa's 120,000
Jews support the anti-apartheid Pro-
gressive Party, Smith said.
The Progressives, traditionally
the country's white opposition party,
have lost in recent national elections
to the Conservative Party, which op-
poses the government's moves to
liberalize apartheid. A Conservative
takeover "will set back the country
enormously," Smith said.
Despite right-wing gains, the Pro-
gressive Party has won back some lost
ground, Smith said.

South African Jews are an in-
tegral part of the white community,
Smith said. South African support for
Israel and the Zionist movement
predates the implementation of apar-
theid, some 40 years ago.
"The government has always
recognized the centrality of Israel and
Zionism in the life of South Africa's
Jews," Smith said.

"Although there are restraints in
moving currency in and out of South
Africa, the government permits move-
ment of funds collected for Israel."
This policy is not meant to keep
South Africa's Jews docile in the face
of apartheid, but out of respect for the
Jewish community, Smith said.
South African Jewish youth is
vigorously anti-apartheid, Smith
said. Yet they have difficulty finding
acceptance in the anti-apartheid
movement because it is anti-Israel.
Some young Jews have denounc-
ed Zionism to join the anti-apartheid
forces, Smith said.

ROUND UP

Non-Orthodox
Petition Israelis

New York (JTA) — Leaders
of the Reform and Conser-
vative movements have laun-
ched separate campaigns urg-
ing their adherents to peti-
tion Israeli leaders not to
change the legal definition of
who is Jewish.
Such a change is being
demanded by Israel's Or-
thodox political parties as the
price of their participation in
a coalition government led by
either Yitzhak Shamir's
Likud or Shimon Peres' Labor
Party.
"This is not a minor con-
cern that will be pushed aside
or soon forgotten," warned
nearly 200 members of the
Board of Trustees of the
Union of American Hebrew

Congregations, meeting in
Atlanta.
The warning was contained
in a letter sent by the policy-
making body of Reform
Judaism's lay membership to
Shamir, Peres and President
Chaim Herzog.

Dov Shilansky
Elected Speaker

Jerusalem (JTA) — Dov
Shilansky, a Likud hardliner
with a penchant for provoca-
tion and confrontation, was
elected speaker of the 12th -
Kensset on Monday.
It was the opening session
of the new parliament, by
tradition a festive occasion.
That it turned out to be the
most raucous and bitter open-
ing session in memory seem-

ed to some observers to be a
foretaste of things to come
should the next government
be a narrowly based coalition
of Likud with the right-wing
and Ultra-Orthodox parties.
Shilansky was an easy win-
ner, getting the votes of
Likud, the far right and the
ultra-Orthodox. Laborites,
centrists and left-wingers
managed 55 votes for Shlomo
Hille, the Laborite who was
speaker of the last Knesset.

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state proclaimed by Yassir
Arafat in Algiers on Nov. 15.
Israel's initial reaction to
the news Monday was to ex-
press regret, a relatively mild
remonstrance in the
language of diplomacy. But
all indications are that it is
not Jerusalem's last word on
the matter.

Parties Battle
Over Recognition

The new crisis in relations
with Egypt came at a time
when Labor and Likud
reportedly were in the
delicate stages of negotiations
over a broad new c9alition to
replace the outgoing
government.

Jerusalem (JTA) — A battle
is looming within the outgo-
ing Labor-Likud unity
government over how to res-
pond to Egypt's recognition of
the independent Palestinian

At this stage, however,
Likud is expected to demand
tough reprisals against Cairo,
at the urging of the far right.
Labor will insist on a more
moderate response.

Canada Elects
Six Jews

Ottawa (JTA) — Six of the
eight Jewish candidates in
Canada's parliamentary elec-
tions Monday won seats in
the new House of Commons.
Most of them bucked the
popular tide that returned
the Progressive Conservative
Party of incumbent Prime
Minister Brian Mulroney to
office with a comfortable ma-
jority of 170 seats in the
295-member house.
Considering that Canada
has a Jewish population of
about 300,000, the number of
Jews running in the national
elections was minuscule.
Observers explained that
Canadian Jews are interested
in politics, but not as a
profession.

THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS

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