THE JEWISH NEWS
SERVING DETROIT'S JEWISH COMMUNITY
THIS ISSUE 60cP
Bias Incidents Jump
In Michigan And U.S.
ALAN HITSKY
Associate Editor
R
eports of anti-Semitic
incidents in Michigan
jumped from 33 in
1988 to 57 in 1989, giving
the state the sixth highest
total of bias complaints in
the country in the annual
audit conducted by the Anti-
Defamation League of B'nai
B'rith.
Richard Lobenthal,
Michigan Region director for
ADL, blames the heavy in-
crease in the state on neo-
Nazi skinhead groups. Na-
tionally, the ADL blamed
skinheads for 8 percent of
the 845 vandalism incidents
and 587 harassment in-
cidents reported, double the
number attributed to
skinheads in 1988.
Lobenthal says a 22-year-
old Auburn Hills resident
has organized skinhead
groups in Grand Rapids,
Flint and Clio, and possibly
in Gibraltar and Wyandotte.
"Clearly, the neo-Nazi
skinheads (in Michigan)
have increased in strength
significantly in the last
year," Lobenthal says.
Although he does not have
conclusive proof, Lobenthal
believes more than half the
incidents in Michigan are
skinhead related, based on
the types of messages
scrawled during an incident.
Major incidents in
Michigan in 1989 included:
• Twenty-five car tires
slashed in Ann Arbor near a
Neo-Nazi
skinheads,
Lobenthal believes,
are responsible for
half the incidents in
Michigan.
home hosting an Israel In-
dependence Day party.
• An outdoor sukkah and
some items inside it burned
at Temple Emanu-El in Oak
Park.
• Swastikas appearing on
the elevators at Lincoln
1990s Issues:
Apathy, Emigres
ELIZABETH APPLEBAUM
Features Editor
R
obert Aronson said he
expected controversy
when he spoke this
week before a local Jewish
group.
Instead, the Jewish
Welfare Federation's exec-
utive vice president received
frequent applause and
praise as he discussed issues,
such as financing the
resettlement of Soviet Jews
and Jewish youths' lack of
interest in Israel, facing the
American Jewish communi-
ty in the 1990s.
More than 40,000 Jews
will leave the Soviet Union
annually in the coming
years, Aronson said at the
Zionist Organization of
America's Einstein Lun-
cheon Forum. Some 1,000
Soviet Jews are expected in
Detroit this fiscal year; 250
of these have no relatives in
Detroit, he said.
Jewish agencies in the
Detroit area already have
been strained trying to deal
with housing, job retraining
and placement, and teaching
English to the new im-
migrants, Aronson said.
One answer to the situa-
tion may be increased cam-
paigns, he said. Jewish
communal leaders already
are predicting a national
campaign for Soviet Jewry
with a $350 million goal.
Jewish communities would
be asked to increase by 50
percent the amount they
raise for their annual local
campaigns. Detroit would
thus be responsible for an
additional $15 million, sole-
ly for the Soviet Jewry cam-
paign, Aronson said.
"That $15 million would
be in addition to meeting our
Continued on Page 22
Towers Apartments in Oak
Park, a building with many
Jewish senior citizens.
• A car literally covered
with neo-Nazi graffiti in
Livonia.
• Vandalism at the Moon
Lake Apartments in Or-
chard Lake.
• The Knights of Pythias
lodge in Waterford suffered
$20,000 in damage July 29.
Anti-Jewish slogans and
Nazi swastikas were daubed
on the building.
• Satanic messages, "The
Holocaust is alive" and "Kill
JAPs" were sprayed on a
storage shed at Andover
High School in Bloomfield
Hills in November.
Lobenthal believes "it is
inconceivable" that there
were only 39 incidents in
Michigan last year. "If you
want my guess, there were
more than 400." He says the
strict reporting criteria used
by ADL eliminates many in-
cidents from being included,
"but what is valid is that we
use the same criteria from
year to year. So the rate of
increase (in the number of
incidents reported) is valid.
It is a very good indicator."
Michigan ADL is trying to
combat anti-Semitism
through its World of
Difference programs in more
than 30 area school districts.
The program for middle and
high school students will be
expanded this year to the
elementary grades with the
completion of a new study
guide. ADL nationally is
considering a similar pro-
gram for college campuses,
which recorded a 30 percent
increase in incidents last
year.
The local ADL has also
created a consortium of
police agencies in
metropolitan Detroit, bring-
ing together officers who
deal with skinheads and
hate crimes to share infor-
mation.
"There was an officer in
Auburn Hills who had a
whole file on skinheads, and
the teen officer in neighbor-
ing Rochester didn't know
him," Lobenthal says.
A tip from the Auburn
Hills officer led to an arrest
Continued on Page 22
JANUARY 19, 1990 / 22 TEVET 5750
CLOSE-UP
CRAIG TERKOWITZ
Rabbi kiln Steinsaltz and Random H0//se
aim JOr a mass market with a
nay English edition.