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FERRE
Soviets' Delay On Direct Flights
Triggers U.S. Back Room Battle
JAMES D. BESSER
6ene[ton
Washington Correspondent
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T
he recent decision by
the Soviets to set aside
the direct flights
agreement with Israel
touched off a pitched battle
in the back rooms of the
Capitol last week.
The controversy involved
an amendment sponsored by
Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.)
that links any waiver of
Jackson-Vanik trade restric-
tions against the Soviets to
the direct flights issue.
Almost every Soviet Jewry
organization — including the
militant Union of Councils
for Soviet Jews — opposed
the Specter measure. Soviet
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Specter and suggested that
he pursue other avenues of
solving the direct flights
question, a sentiment that
was echoed by Tom Dine, ex-
ecutive director of the
American-Israeli public
Affairs Committee (AIPAC).
At a dramatic meeting
last week, a long list of Jew-
ish senators, Soviet Jewry
activists and both Dine and
Arad met with Specter in an
attempt to convince him to
postpone action on his
amendment.
Dine and Arad, according
to several participants, were
in a particularly uncomfor-
table position because of the
mixed message coming from
Jerusalem. Arad got high
marks from several par-
ticipants for handling this
political hot- potato with
skill.
By the end of the meeting,
the assembled senators and
Jewish activists had roundly
praised Specter for his con-
cern for Soviet Jews — and
Specter had agreed to take
no further action on his
amendment, at least for the
time being.
Meanwhile, some Soviet
Jewry activists were pri-
Tom Dine:
Uncomfortable spot.
vately bemoaning the recent
emphasis on the direct
flights question.
"The issue has taken on a
life of its own," said one offi-
cial with a major Soviet
Jewry group here. "The
direct flights question is
symbolically important —
but I'm more concerned
right now that we work
energetically to develop
alternative routes out of the
Soviet Union. It would be a
mistake to invest too much
in this single issue."
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FRIDAY, MARCH 9, 1990
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Arlen Specter:
Different message.
Jewry activists feared that
adding new conditions to
Jackson-Vanik —"moving
the goal posts" was the pop-
ular phrase last week —
would dilute the impact of
the original bill and jeopar-
dize the safety of the
thousands of Jews now
caught in the pipeline.
There was also concern
that the Specter legislation
would be defeated because of
favorable congressional
reaction to the changes
under way in the Soviet
Union — and that a loss
would send a damaging
signal to the Soviets on the
direct flights question.
But Specter was hearing a
different message from some
representatives of the Israeli
government — most notably,
from
. Likud politician Ben-
Arrun Netanyahu, who pri-
vately urged Specter to go
ahead with the amendment.
At the same time, other
Israeli officials were tugging
in the opposite direction; at
midweek, Israeli ambas-
sador Moshe Arad called
Church-State Effects
Vex National Service Bill
Some bills are like
magnets for amendments.
Apparently the National
Service bill that passed the
Senate last week had a par-
ticularly strong attraction to
conservative legislators
eager to tack on pet projects
and proposals.
The bill, which establishes
a wide-ranging program to
promote voluntary service,
had won the active support
of a number of Jewish
groups.
But after a complex series
of parliamentary maneu-
vers, the upper house passed
an amendment that was
offered by Sen. William
Armstrong (R-Colo.) that —
in the eyes of some Jewish
activists here — poses some
serious church-state prob-
lems.
The Armstrong amend-
ment makes it easier for re-
ligious institutions to par-
ticipate in the national ser-
vice program. It would also
allow sectarian institutions
participating in the program
to display religious symbols,
and to allow prayer and the
singing of hymns, as long as
federal money is not used for
these purposes.
"Obviously, we have prob-
lems with this," said Eric
Mazur of the American Jew-
ish Committee. "It's almost
impossible to trace what
money is being used for sec-
tarian versus non-sectarian
purposes. It's bad public
policy, and we don't under-
stand the need for this kind
of amendment."
Another section of the
Armstrong amendment
would allow participating
organizations to favor pro-
spective employees who
agree with the group's re-
ligious tenets — and to show
preference for those already
involved in the group's re-
ligious activities. Both are
provisions that groups like
the American Jewish Corn-
mittee see as outright re-
ligious discrimination.
Action is pending in the
House, where some Jewish
activists are attempting to
produce a bill without simi-
lar amendments.