- 11.0111 111111111110. 4111011111011011011111111111101111111W111111111111111111111111W 411111UP UP FRONT Child Abuse: Emerging From The Shadows LARRY DERFNER Special to The Jewish News A n Israeli suspected of cracking his son's skull open was re- cently released from police custody by a judge here who said the man was needed at home to provide for his fami- ly. A class of Israeli police of- ficers-in-training told child abuse activists that yes, they would arrest a father who slaughtered his daughter's puppy in front of her eyes, but only because it con- stituted cruelty to the dog, not to the child. The Israeli Broadcasting Authority finally allowed an innocuous public service message on child abuse to go on the air, after rejecting seven other proposed spots as too provocative. "They weren't ashamed to say that they didn't want to upset the public," Dr. Hanita Zimrin, founder of the Israel Association for Child Protection, said of her recent confrontations with Larry Derfner is a reporter in Tel Aviv. broadcast officials. "They wanted to show a mother hugging a child, and I told them, 'I'm not talking about hugging a child, I'm talking about beating a child.' " The notion of Jewish mothers beating their chil- dren, breaking their bones, burning them or starving them for days on end is Israeli attitudes toward child abuse still have a long way to go. almost unthinkable. Yet Dr. Zimrin says Israel is the only country she knows of where mothers, not fathers, commit the majority of physical abuse of children. "In Jewish tradition, the mother is in charge of the family, of discipline and punishment," she explains. Israelis have had a hard time getting used to the idea that it's more than a one-in-a- million Jewish psychopath who batters or sexually molests children. Their tra- ditional attitude on child abuse is that it's a gentile sickness — Israeli parents cherish their children too much, they're too upright and moral, and Judaism is too humane ever to allow such a horrible phenomenon to take root here. And, in fact, child abuse is considerably lower in Israel than in Western countries, according to Dr. Zimrin. Other reasons are the relatively low levels of alcoholism and drug abuse, and the intense, almost claustrophobic social life, with friends, neighbors and extended family members keeping in constant touch and dropping by one an- other's homes unannounced. Still, the estimate is that 1.5 percent of Israeli children — about 30,000 boys and girls — are abused, physically or sexually. Israeli attitudes towards child abuse still have a long way to go, but they also have come a long way over the last decade. The best il- lustration of this is the reac- tions to the two deaths from child abuse that took place during this time. In 1983, Na'amed Dalai, who was four, was kicked to death by his father. The newspapers gave it a few paragraphs worth of atten- tion; the court gave the father three years in prison. Today the father is back liv- ing with his wife and other kids. Five years after Na'amad's death, Moran Damias, also four, was beaten to death -by her uncle. By this time, though, the papers saw fit to put the story on the front page and to follow it up for days afterward. TV news shows ran features on child abuse, schoolteachers discussed it with their pupils, and Knesset mem- bers deplored this "new" horror of modern Israeli society. The death of Moran Damias became the turning point in the country's awareness of child abuse. And when her uncle was convicted of his crime, he . didn't get three years in prison, he got 20. One of the myths about child abuse in Israel is that it is fed by the constant ten- sion from terrorist attacks, war and the threat of war. Dr. Zimrin contends that in ROUND UP CAMERA Urges Letters To NPR CAMERA, the Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America, is asking listeners of National Public Radio to write the station and demand fair coverage for Israel. Twice in one day, CAMERA reports, NPR hosted programs in which Israelis' treatment of Pales- tinians was compared to the Nazis' treatment of Jews. In an interview with Liane Hansen of "Weekend Edi- tion," playwright Shauna Kanter discussed her play Pushing Through, which tells two stories, one of Jews in the Holocaust, the other of Israelis tormenting Arabs. In the interview Ms. Kanter explained, "I am merely comparing the stories of violation of one's home, of oppression, from the wo- men's point of view." That same day on "Evening Edition," Israeli journalist Avi Shavit spoke of his experience guarding a Palestinian internment camp in Gaza. He said, "I think that an Israeli Jew, perhaps any Jew, being brought up actually on this traumatic collective memory, cannot be indif- ferent when he sees some- thing that, on the face of it, resembles a concentration camp . . .I mean those internment camps should not exist anywhere, but they certainly should not exist in a Jewish state only 50 years after the Holocaust." According to a spokesman for CAMERA, "NPR, as usual, has chosen to inter- view the exception, the Israeli who would equate his people with mass murderers. Why, one wonders, does NPR not present, say, one of the 10,000 soldiers (who served at the detention camps) who might have ex- plained to listeners the full context of the camps?" CAMERA is urging listeners to remind NPR that human rights violations occur regularly in Syria, Saudi Arabia, Iraq and other Arab nations; that Israel- Palestinian issues are not the root cause of the Middle East conflict; and that U.S. law demands that federally supported networks strictly adhere to "objectivity and balance in all programs or series of programs of a con- troversial nature." Boycott Easy For U.S. Companies New York — American companies that comply with the Arab boycott of Israel are getting off with light penalties from the Internal Revenue Service, according to a report by the World Jew- ish Congress. The General Accounting Office (GAO), the in- vestigative arm of the U.S. Congress, said that "tax penalties appear to be small" in cases it examined of companies complying with the boycott. The GAO also said it had found no evidence that any business had been fined or prosecuted for failing to file IRS Form 5713, which must be filed by any U.S. business that operates in any of the 12 Arab nations that enforce an economic embargo against Israel. The number of companies filing Form 5713 reached a peak of 3,781 in 1981 and has dropped steadily, to 2,104 in 1986. Moldavia Opens Jewish Day School Kishinev — The first state- sponsored Jewish day school in the history of Soviet Moldavia will begin classes in Kishinev in the fall. More than 300 boys and girls already have registered for the secular and Jewish studies classes that will be offered beginning later this month. The Jewish studies program, including inten- sive Hebrew language courses especially intended for students whose families plan to settle in Israel, will be supervised by members of the Lubavitch educational system. Secular studies will Yaakov Weiselbuch, president of the Kishinev Jewish community; Moldavia's Chief Rabbi Zalman Hirsh Leib; and Mircha Druk, prime minister of Moldavia at the Kishinev synagogue. be regulated by the local board of education, and the government will pay for all teachers' salaries. The Moldavian govern- ment was the first in the Soviet Union to approve public displays of Jewish re- ligious symbols and give permits for parades celebrating religious holi- days. Compiled by Elizabeth Applebaum THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS 11