News Uzi Narkiss Ends Tenure With WZO e invite your family to join our family for a week of festive remembrance amidst the beauty of our country resort. During sederim, the Also officiating this Passover voices of Cantor Shimon Friday-Sunday, March 25-April 3 Farkas and Cantor Dov Rabbi Michael Alony Matthew Lazar Farkas will inspire you, Rabbi Abraham Garmaize Choir Director Rabbi accompanied by the Raymond Drillings Mortimer Horowitz Ritual Director '- Concord Symphonic Kosher Supervisor CANTOR SHIMON FARKAS Chorale, directed by Sabbath Elevator Matthew Lazar. Enjoy holiday entertainment, klezmer music, special shows for children and teens, a full day camp program, golf, 16 indoor tennis courts, 33,000 sq. ft. atrium coed fitness center, indoor pool, and much more—plus three delicious meals served daily. We're kosher 365 days a year. And we're only 90 miles from New York City. Direct SHALOM '94 flights daily to nearby Stewart Airport (free transfers Directed & Choreographed from airport to The Concord). by GAVRI LEVI Tue., March 29 Come to The bing, And ?I, Evellf e* so Concord Hotel this Passover. Let us celebrate together as one family. W , CONCORD RESORT HOTEL The Concord Resort Hotel, THE DETRO IT J EWISH NEWS Kiamesha Lake, NY 12751 ir (914) 794-4000 • George Parker, General Manager For reservations and info: 1 800 431-3850 • Fax (914) 794-7471 00 TREADMILLS • STEPPERS • BIKES • SKIERS Birmingham 646-8477 Rochester Hills 375-9707 New York (JTA) — As Uzi Narkiss winds up 27 years with the World Zionist Organization, and a two- year stint heading its American office here, the retired general thinks it is time for the organization to change. Mr. Narkiss believes that as the WZO moves toward its 1997 centenary, the organization founded to implement Theodor Herzl's vision of a Jewish state must shed some of its political structure and gear itself to ensuring a connection bet- ween Israel and the Diaspora. "The State of Israel without the Diaspora is not the same Israel, and the Diaspora without Israel is not the same Diaspora," Mr. Narkiss said in a recent interview with - the Jewish Telegraphic Agency as he prepared his new post as chairman of Israel's Coins and Medals Authority. But the two communities could well drift apart, said Mr. Narkiss, and not only because of declining Jewish identity in the Diaspora. Mr. Narkiss fears that in another decade, as Israel finds itself the largest single Jewish community in the world, it could grow less in- terested in Jews outside its borders. Adding to his fear is the possibility that Israel's reaching peace with its neighbors could lead Israel to "become more interested with its Arab neighbors than with the Jews." "I am very concerned that Israel will not turn, God for- bid, Canaanite," said Mr. Narkiss, referring to an anti- Diaspora ideology that sought to create an Israeli identity rooted in the Middle East and separate from the Jewish religion. In the years just before and after the founding of the State of Israel, a group of in- tellectuals sought common cause with Arabs in forming a new culture. They were often disparaged as "Canaanites," pagans who lived in the land before be- ing conquered by the biblical Israelites. "The WZO has to take on itself, as its main goal, that Israel not turn into Canaan, and that the peace process not come between Israel and the Diaspora," he said. Helping the Diaspora re- main connected to Israel may be the easiest challenge. "It's very possible that Israel will get much more involved in the Jewish com- munity, sending more teachers to the Diaspora, en- suring that every Bar Mitz- vah child will visit Israel," said Mr. Narkiss. "All of these can be the mission of the WZO," he said. But how to help the Israelis is a more com- plicated question. "The Jewishness (of Israelis) is that we live in Israel, go to the army, make a circumcision and say Kaddish," said Mr. Narkiss. "If all the borders are open, the Jewish nature of Uzi Narkiss: Sees need for changes. the state will be diluted," he said. "It's something we have to think about. There's no solution yet." He cites his own grand- children as an example of the Israel- Diaspora gap. "It's hard to get them to listen to what I say — if it's not about computer games — when I say there are young Jews in America. "They want to go to America, but for Disneyland. They want to go to Paris, for EuroDisney. But it doesn't interest them that there are young Jews around the world," he said. If the WZO is going to take on the bold task of reversing this apathy, said Mr. Narkiss, it cannot continue business as usual. Its organizational struc- ture, based on nearly a cen- 4