I BEHIND THE HEADLINES 1°"••• RETAIN MICHIGAN SUPREME COURT JUSTICE PATRICIA J. BOYLE Enlighted Experience for Changing Times" "We must retain Justice Boyle. She is a brilliant, dedicated, fair judge." U.S. Senator Carl Levin VOTE THE NON-PARTISD BALLOT NOVEMBER 6TH! PAID FOR BY THE COMMITTEE TO REMLN JUSTICE PATRICIA J. BOYLE 1401 COMERICA BLDG., DETROIT MI 48226. MARGARET WARD, TREASURER. 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 WINTERIZE YOUR SPRINKLER SYSTEM $ 35 489-5862 RICK WALD ,,,„ones, 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.