SECOND CLASS

THE JEWISH NEWS

SERVING DETROIT'S JEWISH COMMUNITY

SEVENTY-FIVE CENTS

OCTOBER 25, 1991 / 17 CHESHVAN 5752

Local Israelis Dream
Of Real Peace At Home

AMY J. MEHLER

Staff Writer

p

eace in the Middle
East would mean
Dalia and Chaim Levi
from Ramat Hasharon can
quit holding their breaths
every time their children go
off to play or walk back and
forth from school.
They would sleep easier at
night, confident Arab
workers were not hiding out
in nearby fields, waiting for
the cover of darkness to
destroy their day's work or
vandalize Israeli homes.
An end to Arab-Israeli
hostilities would mean
Adina and Doron Lax from
Petach Tikvah wouldn't
have to worry about their 16-
year-old son going to the
border next year. Amos Nir
from the Tel Aviv suburb of
Ranana could relax about
the relative safety of his

family and friends in Israel.
Real and lasting peace —
the kind that ends mourning
for friends and relatives
killed by Arab terrorists,
that ends soldiers patrolling
the shtachim, suspicious of
anyone lurking in an
alleyway, that ends tensing
every hour for chadashot
(news) broadcasts — is worth
any price, said these Israelis,
now living in the Detroit
area. Even if that price
means giving back some of
the land the Arabs want.
The peace conference, set
for Oct. 30 in Madrid, will
attempt to end 43 years of
Arab-Israeli strife and bring
self-rule to the 1.75 million
Palestinian Arabs who live
under Israeli control.
Palestinians want the
West Bank and Gaza Strip,
Israeli occupied land, for
their own state in exchange
for peace. Israel has

adamantly refused this for-
mula as a way to end the
Middle East conflict.
"The Arabs' principles
aren't like yours and mine,"
said Mrs. Lax, 39, who lives
in West Bloomfield. "For
them, land is more impor-
tant than people's lives. For
us it is completely diff-
erent."
Mrs. Levi, who moves back
to Israel this winter, said
today's realities are diff-
erent. "Nothing can be ac-
complished if Israel doesn't
give back at least part of the
occupied territories to the
Arabs," she said. "We'll
build our land; they'll build
theirs. Maybe then they'll be
too busy to bother with us
anymore."
Israel Zilber, 38, from the
Haifa suburb of Kiryat
Tivon, doesn't agree. He be-
lieves nothing can result

Continued on Page 33

PEACE . . .

AT LAST,

BEGINNING

After decades of war,
mistrust, hopes,
prayers and false starts,
what can we expect
from the Mideast
conference?

Page 26

"Conference" of their own: IDF soldiers in Gaza talk with a Palestinian.

Arabs Call Land
Key To Peace

AMY J. MEHLER

Staff Writer

F

or the majority of Arab
Americans, it is ter-
ritory — not peace —
that should be passed
around, sliced up and served
to the Arab guests at the
.peace table this month.
"Peace for peace will not
succeed," said Faisel Arabo,
producer of Detroit's "Arab
Voice," a weekly program
aired on Channel 62. "Only
land for peace will get
desired results."
Mr. Arabo is one of about
60,000 Chaldeans living in
Detroit, the largest concen-
tration of Christian Iraqis
and Christian Syrians out-
side the Middle East. He
prays for the success of the
mission, but can't shake off
what he fears may happen
after the peace conference.
"I know Israel will say
peace for peace, and Arabs
will say peace for land, and
where will that lead us?"
Mr. Arabo said. "I'm afraid
that relations between Israel
and its Arab neighbors could
be worse after this than
before."
What Arabs call Israeli oc-
cupied land, which has long
cast a colossal shadow over
peace, refers to the Golan
Heights, taken from Syria in
the 1967 Six-Day War. It is
also Judea and Samaria, or
the West Bank, taken from
Jordan during the Six-Day
War. And it is the Gaza
Strip, taken at the same
time from Egypt.
"There is no peace without
Israel giving up land," said
Abdallah Wajeeh, 56, a

Detroiter and member of the
Palestine National Council,
the congress which declared
the West Bank and Gaza a
Palestinian state in
November 1988. "Without
the West Bank and Gaza,
what is peace? Peace to live
in refugee camps and in the
Diaspora?
Mr. Wajeeh, born in
Nazareth and deported from
Israel when he was 25,
teaches math in Detroit's
public schools.
"Palestinians want to be
dealt a fair shake and have
an independent state like
Jews," he said. "We want to
control our own destiny.
Autonomy without having
our own state is unaccep-
table to any Palestinian. The
area has had enough strife
and killing. Maybe this can
come to an end for every-
body."
James Zogby, executive di-
rector of the Arab-American
Institute in Washington,
D.C., believes the United
States will not allow the
peace process to fail.
"Israel cannot remain
steadfast in its refusal to
give up territory much
longer," said Mr. Zogby, who
is from Lebanon. "The Pa-
lestinian situation cannot be
allowed to fester. The world
will not allow it. This is why
the far right in Israel is get-
ting antsy. The pressure is
on and no one will let it go
until it's done."
Last week, after the Israeli
cabinet endorsed the peace
talks, the small, far right
Tehiya party announced
that it would quit the

Continued on Page 35