PINIO

Putting The Past Aside
With The Rev. Jackson

ALEXANDER M. SCHINDLER

t is tempting to dwell on
the earlier days when the
black-Jewish alliance
changed the course of
American history by deman-
ng racial justice and an end
to discrimination at lunch
counters and in the voting
booth, in public schools and
public accommodations.
Certainly it is more comfor-
ting to recall the sight of a
Martin Luther King flanked
y Rabbis Abraham Joshua
Heschel and Maurice Eisen-
drath leading tens of
thousands of civil rights mar-
chers than to think about the
',killing of 29-year-old Yankel
Rosenbaum last year by an
gry crowd in Brooklyn
mid cries of "Hitler was
right."
The Rev. Jesse Jackson was
active in those glory days that
we so nostalgically recall. As
an aide to Dr. King he was a
ey player in the coalition of
decency in which blacks and
Jews were such indispensable
partners. But time and events
have led many of us to view
him now as having con-
tributed to those tensions

Rabbi Alexander M.
hindler is president of the
Union of American Hebrew
Congregations, central body of
Reform Judaism. This article
is reprinted with permission
from the Los Angeles Times.

that currently divide our com-
munities, even as he has a
unique potential to be a
bridge over troubled waters.
Yet honesty compels us to
admit that the Jewish com-
munity has failed to respond
to or even acknowledge his ef-
forts to repair the breach. He
confronted Mikhail Gor-
bachev in Geneva on the issue
of Soviet Jewry. lb protest the
obscenity of President
Reagan's visit to Bitburg, he
made his own visit to Ger-
many, to what had been a
Nazi concentration camp. He
has consistently called for im-
proved relations with the
Jewish community.

We have met his
recent efforts with
silence.

In Brussels in July, at an in-
ternational conference on
anti-Semitism, he delivered a
speech clearly aimed at recon-
ciliation with the Jewish com-
munity; he praised Zionism
as a "liberation movement"
and called for Jews and
blacks to renew their joint
fight against racism. He sug-
gested that blacks and Jews
"share church and synagogue
experiences, share our holy
days, so that we might have a
greater appreciation of each
other."
Two weeks later, at the
Democratic convention, he

again reached out, speaking
movingly about the
Holocaust, and praising
Israel Prime Minister Yit-
zhak Rabin's "wisdom in af-
firming negotiation over con-
frontation."
These and other efforts
were often met with suspicion
and silence. But justice and
self-interest demand other-
wise. Let us not nurse our
wounds and translate every
difference into a grievance,
every controversy into com-
bat, every disagreement into
a bloodletting. Only our com-
mon enemies rejoice when
blacks and Jews square off
against each other. Jews can't
afford it. Blacks can't afford
it. America and the world
can't afford it.
We live at a time when
racial and religious and
ethnic tensions are growing,
when "ethnic cleansing" is
ravaging the former
Yugoslavia and xenophobia
fuels violence against
foreigners in Austria and Ger-
many, when gypsies are
threatened in Eastern Europe
and a former imperial grand
wizard of the Ku Klux Klan
wins a majority of white votes
in Louisiana.
In such an hour, we must
look beyond the hurts and
grievances of the past. Blacks
and Jews need each other not
only because of our common
enemies but because of our
common dreams. lbgether, we

Jesse Jackson

share a vision of a just and
open and generous society.
Together we identify with the
weak and the stranger.
lbgether, we hold that it is
the foremost task of govern-
ment to achieve social,
economic and political justice.
Jesse Jackson is an elo-
quent spokesman for that
shared vision. He is the most
widely acknowledged leader
of America's black communi-
ty, a staunch defender of his
people's rights and dignity, a
powerful voice for the poor
and the powerless, the jobless
and the hungry, of every col-
or and creed in our nation. He
has earned the respect of

eace Will Come Piece By Piece

LEONARD FEIN

Special to The Jewish News

H

ere, a short while
back, is what Imam
Sheick Ahmed
Ibrahim said in the course of
his Friday sermon to 20,000
worshippers in the
"Palestine" mosque in Gaza:
"Six million descendants of
monkeys now rule in all the
nations of the world, but
their day, too, will come.
Allah! Kill them all, do not
leave even one."
The words of the Imam, a
leader of Hamas, the funda-
entalist Islamic movement
that is most likely the domi-
nant power in Gaza and has
made substantial inroads in
the West Bank, were re-
.ported by the moderate
Israeli journalist Yehuda
Litani.
And I, a disciple of
peaceful coexistence and

other such sweetnesses, call
these words to our collective
attention, not to add fuel to
the fires of hatred and
resentment, but in order to
draw us closer to the
realities of Israel's cir-
cumstance. For we now
move from the time of tired
slogans of both right and
left, "land for peace" and
"territorial integrity" alike,
to a time of tough and
sometimes maddening deci-
sions.
What can we make of the
murderous language of the
Imam, who means, of course,
by his "descendants of the
monkeys," the Jews? All of
them. All of us.
Is it not remarkable that
such language is permitted
by the Israeli authorities?
However clumsy the occupa-
tion has been, and however
bloody, it appears that the
Israeli authorities exercise
some restraint.

Might it be true, as some
hawks have taken such
delight in observing, that
devout Muslims have no
choice but to thirst for Jew-
ish blood, since they are so
instructed by their texts?
Surely it is true that one can
find textual sources for sen-
timents such as those the

We now move from
the tired slogans of
both left and right
to a time of tough
and sometimes
maddening
decisions.

Imam expresses. Alas, one
can find analogous sources
in Jewish texts, as Rabbi
Meir Kahane was so adept at
doing.
Some years back, the
distinguished Israeli scholar
(and former Chief of Military

Intelligence and former Ad-
viser to the Prime Minister
on Terrorism) Yehoshafat
Harkabi came to the conclu-
sion that it is time for us to
expunge from our texts its
egregious endorsements of
murder and hate. Whether
or not Mr. Harkabi's pro-
posal has merit, it is clear
that neither Judaism nor
Islam is composed wholly, or
even principally, of such
texts.
On the contrary, the tradi-
tional texts of both religions
provide dozens of examples
of peaceable sentiment for
every one vengeful line.
Without for a millisecond
apologizing on the Imam's
behalf or making excuses for
his foul words, one can
observe that the textual
foundations for such words
are neither a necessary nor a
sufficient condition for their
incorporation into the views
of religious people.

millions of Americans as a
leader of political, intellec-
tual and moral power on the
great and vexing issues of our
time. And he has grown, and
changed, and reached out.
At a time when the toxic
waters of racism are rising
from the Urals in Europe to
the bayous of Louisiana, Jews
should welcome the hand
Jesse Jackson has extended
to us. Let us do so for our own
sake, for America's sake, for
Israel's sake, for the sake of
justice, brotherhood and
peace — for all the moral prin-
ciples and ethical values Jews
have stood and died for dur-
ing our history as a people. ❑

I wish the texts were alto-
gether benign, offered no
shred of legitimacy to the
preachers of hate. But they
are not. So the question
becomes not what the texts
permit, but what lessons
people choose to derive from
the texts.
Yet is it not the case that
many Palestinians choose to
derive terrible lessons from
them? And if that be the
case, how can Israel ever
imagine a pacific resolution
to the conflict? The Imam
wants Palestine, all of it; in
his view, the PLO is far too
accommodating, too
moderate. How can one live
with such people? How can
one imagine that their hate
will ever dissipate?
Not easily, not soon. But
the operative question then
becomes how, in conditions
of relative safety, one can
begin to disentangle the two
peoples. What we know of

THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS

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