PURELY COMMENTARY
PHILIP SLOMOVITZ
Editor Emeritus
Vigilance As A Duty In Rejecting All Forms Of Bigotry
V
igilance in its mul-
tiple aspects of identi-
fying the battle
against all forms of prejudice
and bigotry gained increasing
responsibility in the most re-
cent evidences of bias against
Jews and Israel.
Even in instances in which
Jews played leading roles op-
posing apartheid in South
Africa, there has been bias
against Jews from those who
should have acclaimed their
partnership in the battle for
justice.
A letter addressed to
Nelson Mandela by one who
was one of the original
organizers of the forces
against the South African
prejudices condemned his
report to an alliance with
anti-Israel terrorist Arafat.
The latter, published April 13
in The Jewish News, is an in-
dication of the importance of
vigilance in the tasks of bat-
tling anti-Semitism.
This is where the Jewish
press becomes a vital,
perhaps the most vital, in-
strument in demanding
justice.
Cecil Eprile, who was forc-
ed to leave South Africa some
35 years ago, now resides in
Los Angeles. His daughter is
married to the son of
Detroiter Fred Winkleman.
Eprile addressed a challenge
to Nelson Mandela. He did it
as one of Mandela's first
associates in the movement
against apartheid. He
presented the case for justice
and also for truth with
forcefulness. There is elo-
quence in his request for
fairness.
It is not enough that South
African Jewish leaders
should have expressed shock
over an embracing of Nelson
Mandela and Yassir Arafat.
Lovers of justice and freedom
of all races and faiths should
speak out against comforting
one who seeks the degrada-
tion and destruction of Israel.
That Mandela should have
given encouragement to
Arafat while embracing him,
with a comment that Arafat
is fighting the type of col-
onialism that he himself was
engaged in, represents distor-
tion of fact and failure to
recognize the support he
always had from Jews.
Mandela was asked
whether his endorsement of
Arafat with anti-Israel com-
ments might alienate South
Africa's 100,000 Jews who are
active in anti-apartheid par-
ties. He retorted, "If the truth
alienates the powerful Jewish
community in South Africa,
that is too bad."
The challenge to Mandela
merits permanence in the
records of eternal vigilance. It
merits recognition of the
Jewish share in the battle for
justice in South Africa and
rebukes a major leader in
that struggle for failure to
acknowledge that debt while
joining a terrorist advocate,
thereby adding to the lies
against Jewry.
This open letter should be
read and reread with copies
addressed anew to Mandela
and circulated wherever there
can be an emphasis for truth
and for fairness to Jewry and
to Israel. Here is a brief ex-
cerpt from the Cecil Eprile
letter:
Dear Nelson,
I am one of a number of
Jews who claim you as a
friend. Our friendship
started some 35 years ago
when I became founding
editor of Post, South
Africa's first mass circula-
tion tabloid Sunday
newspaper for non-whites.
At a meeting in my home
in Johannesburg (remem-
ber?) you arranged for me
to get regular confidential
briefings about African
National Congress ac-
tivities so that I could
publish accurate news
about the ANC without
prejudice to its security.
Let it be
remembered that
we have a duty to
eternal vigilance.
My whiteness was never an
issue with you.
A few years later when
you were on the run with a
price on your head, you
came, disguised as a chauf-
feur, to see me at my home
— and shortly before your
arrest, you got one of your
aides to bring me to your
hiding place. You did so,
you told me, because you
trusted me.
Since those days I have
watched you from afar
with pride and affection. I
shared the joy with many
others when you walked
out of prison. During your
long years of captivity you
had assumed in my mind
the symbol of a Moses,
echoing the ancient cry,
"Let my people go!" Now
you were set to become a
Joshua preparing to bring
your people into the Pro-
mised Land.
But I have to tell you as
an old friend that my heart
fell, as many other Jewish
hearts must have fallen,
when, in front of the
world's cameras, you em-
braced the PLO's Yassir
Arafat as a comrade in
arms, saying, "Like us he is
fighting against a unique
form of colonialism and we
wish him success in his
struggle."
You have a right to em-
brace whom you wish and
to say that the enemies of
Israel are not your
enemies. I can understand
Continued on Page 46
Beware Of Religion Becoming Political
lectoral reform in
Israel as a way of
eliminating the power
of a handful of fanatics from
undermining the very ex-
istence of Israel becomes even
more vital with the menace to
Israel's political functions in
the latest Knesset experience.
Denial of the power exercis-
ed by a mere handful would
serve an even greater pur-
pose. It would prevent the dic-
tators from Brooklyn from
telling their followers in Eretz
Israel how to vote and how to
control Israel's political
system. Now, under present
conditions, they can do it.
Denied such power in a revis-
ed and properly reformed
electoral rule, there can be an
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Vol. XCVII No. 9
2
April 27, 1990
FRIDAY, APRIL 27, 1990
end to dictation to Jerusalem
from Brooklyn.
The people of Israel know
how serious is the issue. They
are demonstrating against
the present senseless way of
organizing the Knesset. The
limited voices of fanaticism
which follow Brooklyn orders
have enabled the few to create
political powers and dictate as
they just have in interference
with sensible government.
The necessary revision is
overdue.
At the very outset, when
Israel's governments were be-
ing organized, David Ben-
Gurion knew the weakness of
the present system. He hoped
for a change and the adoption
of an American way of
political life. Since then,
Israeli governments were
formed by means of bargain-
ing for power, thereby gran-
ting to the handful control of
the ultimate. When Ben-
Gurion needed a minute
religious party to organize a
government, he yielded to it.
Therefore, the need to end the
struggle for power by reform-
ing the electoral system.
Like all issues affecting
Israel, it is the business of the
people of Israel. Now there is
reason to believe that corn-
mon sense will finally
triumph. President Chaim
Herzog is among the leaders
in the battle for Israel's elec-
toral reform. Surely, they will
not procrastinate.
The indignities affecting
Israel are closer to home on
orders to Jerusalem from
Brooklyn. Are there pro-
testing voices to declare
whether they wish Brooklyn
to speak for them when opi-
nions are expressed? Who
should be in the Israeli
government?
In an op-ed editorial page
comment in the New York
Times, April 14, under the ti-
tle "From Zion, Not From
Brooklyn," with a subtitle "A
Rabbi Damages Israel," there
is a summation about the
obstruction of a government
in Israel. Rabbi Allan Nadler,
who teaches at McGill
University in Montreal and
occupies the pulpit of Shaar
HaShamayim Synagogue ex-
presses abhorrence over the
roles of several extreme Or-
thodox rabbis. He analyzed
the position of Rabbi
Menahem Mendel Shneerson,
the Grand Rabbi of Lubavitch
who serves his people from
Brooklyn, and the influence
that was exerted in the
political struggle in Israel by
Rabbi Eleizer Menahem
Shach. The critical article by
Rabbi Nadler contains these
observations and his treat-
ment of the issue especially
involving Brooklyn:
Although the exploitative
theocratic politics of the
religious parties are
nothing new in Israel,
there is something par-
ticularly outrageous and
galling about these most
recent interventions.
Though Rabbi Shach's
tactics may be irritating
and distasteful to many
Israelis, he and his
followers in B'nai Brak and
Jerusalem are a legitimate
part of Israel's political life.
He may not be a Zionist,
and his disciples may not
all serve in the army, but
they are citizens who pay
taxes and vote.
The same cannot be said
of Rabbi Schneerson, who
directs one of the most
powerful Jewish organiza-
tions in the world from his
headquarters in the Crown
Heights section of
Brooklyn.
This is not his first foray
into Israeli politics. Just
over a year ago, Rabbi
Schneerson created un-
precedented antagonisms
between disaspora Jews
and Israel by instructing
members of the religious
Agudat Israel Party to
make an Orthodox amend-
ment to Israel's Law of
Return the absolute condi-
tion for entering into a
coalition with either Likud
of Labor. The proposed
amendment would have
denied the Jewishness of
converts to Conservative
and Reform Judaism.
It was the intense furor
throughout the diaspora
formented by Rabbi
Schneerson's insistence on
that amendment that forc-
ed Likud and Labor away
from the religious parties
and back into a national
unity coalition .. .
The state of Israel was
founded by visionaries
whose goal was to nor-
malize the Jewish people.
A critical part of that nor-
malization involved the
emancipation of Jews not
only from European and
anti-Semitism but also
from the authority of a rab-
binic oligarchy that had
controlled the thinking
and behavior of most Jews
since the Middle Ages.
In recent years, most of
my Orthodox colleagues,
among them many
followers of Rabbi
Schneerson, have ad-
Continued on Page 46