gled out and whipped...It gives courage
to those who are anti-Semitic to say,
'what difference does it make?' David
Dinkins was with the Jews — and he still
got attacked.' The Crown Heights neigh-
borhood has become very politicized,
very nasty; constantly whipping Dink-
ins is exacerbating the whole thing."
And a harsh, divisive mayoral contest
would draw national attention to the
black-Jewish rift, and help politicize the
rift in a way that would do additional
damage to the relationship between the
two communities, said Abraham Fox-
man of ADL.
Jews may turn against Mr. Dinkins
because of his performance in office, he
said. But if the national spotlight on the
election makes the Jewish vote look sole-

ly like a referendum on race — and if the
media continues fanning the flames of
conflict — the result could be an escala-
tion of the black-Jewish crisis.
"Crown Heights is being politicized
by the minute," he said. "And that
means that the chance that this will spill
over grows by the minute."
Richard Green blames the media for
much of the problem. Mr. Green, 35,
runs the Crown Heights Youth Collec-
tive, a highly praised program designed
to help members of different ethnic or
racial groups cope with their differences.
"If the media didn't show up, this would
just fizzle," he said of the tensions, not-
ing that "people in this neighborhood
are talking together, but that doesn't
show up."

Mr. Green, who is black, has seen the
neighborhood change over the 35 years
he has lived there from 85 percent Jew-
ish to 85 percent black. In his experi-
ence, he said, when people of different
backgrounds discuss their differences,
the dialogue becomes more positive.
In general, black leaders have been
reluctant to speak out about Crown
Heights — at least to Jews.
Rep. Charles Rangel (D-N.Y.) and sev-
eral prominent black clergymen involved
in black-Jewish issues did not return a
reporter's phone calls. The congressional
black caucus, according to observers in
Washington, has been unusually silent
on the black-Jewish issue.
But Rev. Jesse Jackson, often re-
garded as an irritant in black-Jewish re-

lations, has been A Crown
playing an active Heights street:
and constructive role
in trying to keep the blacks and
Crown Heights con- Jews live in
troversy from taint- close proximity
ing black-Jewish but are wary of
relations nationally, each other.
according to a num-
ber of Jewish ac- Photo By Jacob El-Baz
tivists.
In recent weeks,
Rev. Jackson has been in almost daily
contact with Jewish leaders, and he has
spoken out forcefully — although in very
general terms — for black- Jewish rap-
prochement before African-American
audiences, asserting that when conflicts
arise, "our leadership must turn to each