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SOME TALK ABOUT CHANGE,
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v Professor of Constitutiional Rights
v Legislative Attorney, United States Congress
v Legal Clerk, General Consul of West Bloomfield
v B'nai B'rith Barristers Bar Association
v Jewish Federation Political Awareness Committee
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being demonized. And yet,
some of the more vocal
members of the audience
were doing to Jews exactly
what they said the press was
doing to Arabs.
My patience with this line
of questioning finally ended
when one man, alluding to
an award that a Jewish
group had given President
Bush after the Gulf War, in-
quired whether the presi-
dent would have been so
honored if one Israeli baby
had been killed in the war
instead of hundreds of
thousands of Iraqis.
"One of the problems I
have with sort of discus-
sion," I responded irritably,
"is that we end up pitting
pain against pain. I don't
like that . . . We'll end up
seeing each other as nonen-
tities. We need to see other
other compassionately."
When the panel ended
almost two hours after it
began, the bellicosity of the
questions — and the one
time the audience hissed me
— convinced me that I had
nary a friend among the 800
people in the hall. Yet I was
instantly surrounded by
about 40 people who, in the
most friendly manner, cor-
rected me on a few minor
points I had made during the
discussion, or said they had
agreed with me, or con-
gratulated me on my
"courage" to appear before a
group of American Arabs.
I was stunned — and
gratified. From the dias, I
had detected only skeptics,
nit-pickers and ideologues
out front. But now, I real-
ized, there was another uni-
verse behind the vitriol I had
heard, one that had the good
will and the decent inten-
tions to bridge the pain and
the suspicions that are deep-
ly embedded in the Jewish
and Arab communities.
I heard about a Jewish-
Arab dialogue group with
several hundred members in
California's Orange County
and about a smaller group in -
Cambridge, Mass., and I
heard of hope, which is much
more than I had heard from
the podium.
But I also could not forget
that during the 120 minutes
of the panel discussion, I had
heard another ethnic group's
intense resentment against
the news media, resent-
ments that are very similar
to those of the Jewish com-
munity. And I wryly thought
that if the notion of bias was
enough to unite people,
there would be a great con-
federation between U.S.
Jews and Arabs.
And I quite sadly recog-
nized that until Jew and
Arab can talk with each
other without such an en-
counter becoming a mark of
"courage," then both sides
will lose the promise of such-
meetings. For courage did
not bring me to the Ameri-
can-Arab convention, and I
will not pretend with a
macho swagger that it did:
I went to hear the pain of
others and for them to hear
mine.
❑
Israel Makes Cuts
Cancels 4,000 Houses
Jerusalem (JTA) — The
government made what it
called its final housing cuts
this week, announcing the
cancellation of another 4,000
units, this time outside the
administered territories.
According to the Finance
Ministry, the new freeze br-
ings up to 11,981 the
number of housing units
that will not be built, 5,364
of them in the territories.
According to these latest
figures, 1,400 fewer units in
the territories are being
cancelled than the govern-
ment had announced in its
initial decision last week.
The construction freeze is
being presented as part of
the government's declared
policy to divert funds from
the building industry to in-
frastructure projects within
the Green Line, Israel's pre-
1967 border that does not in-
clude the territories.
According to the treasury,
the building freeze will save
the state some $650 million
for next year's budget.
"This will be the real
alternative to the building
industry and the real alter-
native to create new jobs,"
said Finance Minister
Avraham Shohat.
As a general rule, the
government has not touched
housing units already under
construction. But Housing
Minister Binyamin Ben-
Eliezer, belying the
"finality" of this week's an-
nouncement, said Monday
that an additional 2,000
units in the territories, still
at the initial stages of con-
struction, may be cancelled
if there is no further demand
for housing there.