I BEHIND THE HEADLINES 1°"•••
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JUSTICE
PATRICIA J. BOYLE
Enlighted Experience for
Changing Times"
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a brilliant, dedicated, fair judge."
U.S. Senator Carl Levin
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Germany
Continued from preceding page
As he prepares to embark
on his retirement in Berlin,
he is sanguine about the
future of a united Germany,
except . . .
"The working people of the
German Democratic Repub-
lic did an enormous job to
create a new, anti-fascist
Germany, but now I am very
worried about the
manifestations of a new anti-
Semitism —there are anti-
Semitic slogans and the
desecration of Jewish
cemeteries.
"Right now," adds Mr.
Reichel, "the far right-wing
does not have great in-
fluence in the GDR, but we
will have to be careful to
prevent a movement in that
direction. This is a very im-
portant task for all the peo-
ple in what was East Ger-
many.
"I am concerned about
this, you see, because in
Berlin some of my best
friends are Jews."
Helmut Wegner, Minister
at the embassy of the Fed-
eral Republic in London,
does not share these con-
cerns. Anti-Semitism, he
says, is a function of
"economic envy, discontent
and impoverishment."
Such conditions might in-
deed prevail in East Ger-
many now, but he is certain
that the economic har-
monization of the two former
Germanys will be quickly
accomplished — within
three years — and then any
cause for anti-Semitic sen-
timents will melt like snow
in the morning sun.
He brushes aside any
danger of resurgence by the
extreme right-wing Repub-
lican Party, led by former SS
officer Frans Schoenhuber,
declaring the party extinct,
despite its showing in West
Germany's regional elec-
tions earlier this year when
it won up to 15 percent of the
vote in some areas.
Besides, adds Mr. Wegner,
anti-Semitism is unlikely to
take root and flourish in the
newly reconstituted state;
there are, he points out, very
few Jews left in Germany. ❑
Iraq's 'Beer, Bacon
And Rabbis' Approach
IRA RIFKIN
Special to The Jewish News
D
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74
FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 2, 1990
isinformation cam-
paigns seldom ven-
ture into the sublime.
But efforts by Iraq's Saddam
Hussein appear to have
stretched to the lower limit
of the ridiculous.
According to reports in
The Washington Post and
elsewhere, the state-run Ira-
qi press has recently
published stories claiming
that the Saudi Arabian royal
family is of Jewish ancestry.
Newsweek noted such Iraqi
press "inventions" as stories
about American Jewish
troops eating kosher food in
the Saudi Arabian desert
and Israeli pilots flying
Saudi military aircraft.
The Iraqi newspaper An-
Nida has also printed an ar-
ticle containing claims of
proof that Kuwait's royal
family is descended from
Christian Crusaders.
As for Saddam Hussein,
Iraqi media has taken to
portraying him as a direct
descendant of Islam's foun-
ding prophet, Mohammed,
despite that Mohammed's
family line is well-known to
devout Moslems. Iraq's offi-
cial story is that he is
Ira Rifkin is an assistant
editor at our sister newspaper,
the Baltimore Jewish Times.
descended from
Mohammed's son-in-law,
Ali, who is revered by Shiite
Moslems.
The Iraqi leader and his
ruling elite — who, ironical-
1 y , came to power as
secularists — are not
Shiites. But Shiites comprise
55 percent of Iraq's popula-
tion, and, as a community,
are religious fundamenta-
lists to whom the govern-
ment's claims are of great
importance.
Ted Koppel, the host of
ABC-TV's "Nightline", re-
ferred to the Iraqi media ac-
counts as the "beer, bacon
and rabbis" approach
toward stirring up Arab
resentment over American
troops in Saudi Arabia,
home to Islam's holiest
shrines.
Devout Moslems do not
consume alcoholic drinks or
eat pork products and equate
rabbis with arch-enemy
Israel. By spreading such
stories, Iraq hopes to weaken
continued Arab support for
the united military front ar-
rayed against it.
As ridiculous as it might
sound, this sort of disinfor-
mation — the current term
for what used to be called
propaganda — is said to be
an effective tool for rallying
support among Iraqis, who
generally have no access to
non-state approved media.