EDITORIAL

Dignity For AIDS Patients

By now, we've all had a chance to learn
about Mary Fisher's tragic positive test for
HIV, the virus that can lead to AIDS. Be-.
cause she is the daughter of Max Fisher, a
man beloved in the worldwide Jewish
community and a man known for his multi-
millions and his political clout, Mary
Fisher's story was reported extensively.
There are those, however, whose stories
will end in an inner city nursing home with
little or no contact with the Jewish com-
munity they knew. These are people who
were educated in our Hebrew schools, who
brought nachos to their families and who
largely did everything we told them to do.
They are or were our next-door neighbors,
the little boy who once played ball down
the street or the teen-aged kid who shovel-
ed the snow off your driveway. And as Ms.
Fisher clearly showed us, it can also be the

mother of two children we met at the art
gallery.
We find as a Jewish community that we
are ill equipped to even give our loved ones
dying of AIDS a place to lie down and die.
Precious few of us have the resources that
Mary Fisher will have to battle her afflic-
tion. But the Jewish community needs to at
least afford an opportunity for its AIDS pa-
tients to rest in dignity. Now we are shut-
ting doors to them. We're asking them not
to be part of us, not to come home.
But when we look at one another, it
should be like a mirror. We should see
ourselves in each other. And we should
learn from Mary Fisher's brave actions
that this disease belongs exactly where she
put it, out in the open. Not out of reach, but
in our actions, discussions, pocketbooks
and, most of all, in our compassion.

Cycle Of Violence

One senses the cycle of violence increas-
ing in the Middle East. Israelis in the north
were back in bomb shelters during rocket
attacks from southern Lebanon, and army
chief of staff Ehud Barak was warning that
"the aggressors will pay a heavy price."

The latest round of bloodshed began last
Friday night with an Arab attack on a
lightly manned army post in Israel. The
terrorists, believed to be from the Yassir
Arafat-led Fatah section of the Palestine
Liberation Organization, hacked to death
three soldiers while they slept.
On Sunday, Israel struck back, attacking
two Palestinian refugee camps in southern
Lebanon said to harbor terrorists, re-
portedly killing four civilians. Hours later,
Israeli helicopters fired on a convoy in
southern Lebanon, killing Hezbollah leader
Sheik Musawi, an arch-enemy of Israel

who helped plan numerous terrorist at-
tacks against the Jewish state.
Fifty thousand Shiite Muslims attended
the sheik's funeral, calling for revenge.
"We shall make the earth shake under the
feet of the Zionists," Musawi's deputy,
Sheik Naim Qassem, told the crowd.
Mideast observers fear that the bloodsh-
ed will increase, even as Palestinian
spokesmen say they will not attend the
latest round of peace talks, scheduled for
next week in Washington, in protest of
Israeli actions.
The idea of peace talks taking place when
terrorists are sent into Israel to murder
sleeping soldiers is difficult to fathom. But
the point of the peace talks is to settle deep-
seated differences through words rather
than swords. The recent violence only
underscores the importance of parties at-
tending, not boycotting, the negotiations.

Sitting Pat

A.M. Rosenthal has been one of the few
journalists to confront Patrick Buchanan's
long history of pronouncements about
Israel, American Jews and Nazi war trials
and label them anti-Semitic.
Now that Mr. Buchanan has enhanced
his political stature with his surprisingly
strong showing in the New Hampshire
primary, it is time for the rest of the main-
stream media to take a serious look at the
Buchanan record and be prepared to con-
demn his anti-Semitic statements.
Over the years Mr. Buchanan has come
to the defense of several Nazi war
criminals, seeking to place the burden of
proof on the Jews regarding the historical
accuracy of the Holocaust; he has shown
insensitivity in Jewish-Catholic relations,
including Jewish concerns about the
presence of a convent at Aushwitz; and he
sought to portray Israel and American
Jews as the prime instigators in pushing
the U.S. toward war in the Persian Gulf
last year.

6

FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 21, 1992

Last Friday, Mr. Rosenthal, in his New
York Times op-ed page column, noted that
even before the New Hampshire primary,
Mr. Buchanan had "achieved a remarkable
victory" for not only introducing "anti-
Semitism into the mainstream of Ameri-
can politics," but for making it
"acceptable, respectable enough to ignore
— and potentially profitable."

At least one of Mr. Rosenthal's col-
leagues has joined him in responding to
those who dismiss the charges against Mr.
Buchanan. Writing in the March 2 issue of
The New Republic, literary editor Leon
Wieseltier takes his colleague Michael
Kinsley to task for defending Mr.
Buchanan against charges of anti-
Semitism.

In the days ahead, Pat Buchanan will be
receiving more media attention. It's impor-
tant that the record reflect his disturbing
and dangerous attitudes toward Israel and
American Jewry.

NOTEBOOK

Pressuring Israel
Will Only Backfire

GARY ROSENBLATT

Editor

A study made
public in Israel
last week found
that every at-
tempt by Wash-
ington to exert
political pres-
sure on Jerusa-
lem in recent years has
backfired.

Surprise, surprise.
The greater the pressure
on Israel, the greater the
support for Israel's
resistance among Israeli
citizens, whether the issue
was negotiating with the
Palestine Liberation Organ-
ization or exchanging land
for peace.
Now the U.S. is insisting
that to qualify for the $10
billion loan guarantee to
benefit Jewish immigrants
from the former Soviet
Union, Jerusalem must put
a halt to new settlements in
the territories occupied since
the 1967 war.
And with its typical in-
your-face response, the
Shamir government is say-
ing it may prefer to go it
alone and face economic
chaos rather than soften its
ideological stand on its right
to build settlements
anywhere and everywhere
within the land of Israel.
Both sides talk about the
importance of helping the
new immigrants find hous-
ing and employment in the
Jewish state, about the spe-
cial relationship Washing-
ton and Jerusalem enjoy and

about how diplomats from
the U.S. and Israel are
meeting to work out a com-
promise.
But the truth is that both
sides are being stubborn to
prove a point. Washington is
angry over Israel's increase
of settlements during the
peace negotiations and is
fearful of upsetting the
Arabs and jeopardizing the
talks, the administration's
one diplomatic jewel.
Israel is angry over being
bullied by the U.S. on what
Jerusalem considers an
internal matter. Moreover,
the Shamir government is
predicated on the right of
Jews to live anywhere they
choose in their state.
The basic difference is that
for 25 years, Washington
has regarded the territories
as land whose ultimate
disposition remains
unresolved. While for Yit-
zhak Shamir and the
majority of Israelis, those
territories, including the
West Bank (Judea and
Samaria), east Jerusalem,
Gaza and the Golan Heights,
are part of Israel.
They were taken in war
with Israeli blood and
whether or not they are in
some manner relinquished is
a decision that rests with
Israel.
Past U.S. administrations
have, to varying degrees,
soft-pedaled that critical
policy difference over the
disposition of the territories.
But this administration has
been aggressive in its
stance, even calling into

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