Community Views

Editor's Notebook

Why David Cole
Was On Page 1

The Vatican And Israel:
A Personal View

PHIL JACOBS EDITOR

RABBI IRWIN GRONER SPEC AL TO THE JEW SH NEWS

The phone at The
Jewish News has
been ringing off
the hook this
week. Editors
and reporters
have been greet-
ed with signs of
perplexity from
some community

H

/

members
Excuse me, am I still here in
Detroit?
Isn't this the town that in the
1940s read about Father Cough-
lin of the Shrine of the Little
Flower on the front page of the
Detroit Jewish News? Some of
Father Coughlin's hate was cov-
ered in issue after issue back
then. His message was seen for
what it was and stopped, large-
ly due to exposure by this news-
paper. It was hard to read, but
we needed to read it.
Wasn't it in Detroit that com-
munity members learned on the
front page that Adolph Hitler
was exterminating Europe's
Jews? Again, this was terrible
news. It was covered with more
passion and detail than even in
the large daily newspapers of
the time. There were social
events to cover and feature sto-
ries to write and even Allied
Jewish Campaign stories to cov-
er. But Hitler made the front
page of The Jewish News. Our
readers knew who he was and
what he was saying.
What about our series of
"friends:" Egypt's Nasser and
the PLO's Arafat, Iraq's Hus-
sein, Nation of Islam's Far-
rakhan? Not to push the point
too far, but haven't they been on
the front page of The Jewish
News?
Now, let's talk about all of
them. Do we think one by one
that these men were the most
stable of thinkers? Were they
Rennaisance men, rocket sci-
entists? The priest said over na-
tional radio that Jews ran the
country and the media. The
chancellor decided that sys-
tematic destruction of European
Jewry was the way to go. Nass-
er tried to destroy Israel, and
some say Arafat still is trying.
Last week, in a full-page New
York Times ad, the Anti-
Defamation League reprinted
excerpts of a hateful, anti-Se-
mitic speech made at a college
by a Farrakhan lieutenant. It
was so bad that even the Rev.
Jesse Jackson publicly shook his
head in regret.
Do articles on these men, or
as many in my community like
to call them, "nuts," belong
somewhere next to the club
notes in the back of the paper?
Or isn't it a better idea that we
place them right where they be-
long, on Page 1?
I want to know about haters,

especially the ones who lead or
are part of groups that have
numbers in the hundreds of
thousands. I want to know
where they live, what they
think, where they are going
with their movement. I even
want to know it if they happen
to be Jewish.
Last week on our front page,
we highlighted revisionist David
Cole, a prize for those who deny
the Holocaust because he is
Jewish. Readers called us to
complain, wrote letters threat-
ening to cancel, even stopped
advertising. Why? Because in
their words, we "insulted" Holo-
caust survivors and we gave
credibility to this man and his
message.
Folks, it would have been giv-
ing this man credibility if we de-
nied he was out there, if we
permitted him to grow, like a
fungus, in the dark. Why do we
as Jews continue to deny that
these people are out there? "Yes,
they are out there," says one an-
gry reader, "but I don't want
their face staring at me in my
Jewish News."
Hitler gained power while
many of our now deceased loved
ones kept saying that he was lit-
tle known and would go away

Don't we need
to know about
Hitler, Hussein,
Arafat and Cole?

one day. He didn't go anywhere.
We should all go to the Holo-
caust Memorial in West Bloom-
field and see the display of the
Jewish family at a Sabbath
table looking with horror at
their front door. The image is
that someone is knocking,
maybe with the stock of a rifle.
Truth is, the story of the Holo-
caust was often buried by edi-
tors, some of them Jewish
editors. While those stories were
buried, so were our people.
These stories on these haters,
these threats to the way we live
should get front-and-center
treatment. The Holocaust only
happened 50 years ago, not an-
cient history. This very year, a
U.S. Olympic luger was at-
tacked in public by skinheads.
Violence against Jews is hap-
pening and more people identi-
fy with groups such as White
Supremacists and skinheads.
Indeed, the scariest letter I
ever received since moving to
Detroit came my first year. It
was a personal letter, and in it,
the writer wrote, "Are you
afraid ofjackboots in the night?
Jews must certainly be con-

gratulated for their cleverness
in discovering and exploiting the
weakness in the sensitive and
loving Christian psyche, by
which Jews have made Jewish
organizations, the State of Is-
rael and even individual Jews
virtually immune from criti-
cism, in spite of their need for it.
But even the stupid goyim are
coming to see this exploitation
for what it is, what with every
other group -- blacks, women,
Indians, homosexuals, you
name it — demanding to be
treated just like the Jews ."
The letter writer went on to
write that the "Offical Jewish
Version of the Holocaust" is "se-
riously flawed" and "self-inflict-
ed." "If not for the hysterical
intervention of people like your-
self who insist that the Offical
Version cannot be questioned,
the matter would have re-
mained a relatively obscure con-
troversy of little interest to
anyone except professional his-
torians. As it is, the revisionists
have the Jews cornered. Shame
on you, Jacobs. The quicker you
and your brethren fess up, the
quicker they will stop cornering
your people." David Cole stays
on the front page. And so will
Vladimir Zhirinovsky and any
other figure that poses a threat.
After reading Elizabeth Ap-
plebaum's Jan. 21 story, we all
should be learning what we as
Jews can do to dispute revi-
sionism. There are those among
us who feel it too ridiculous, too
insulting to even give attention.
That's one way to hide from it.
Instead, we need to understand
that in this country, revisionists
have a right to say what they
want. However, we have a right
and a duty to show them that
they are wrong. This comes with
the full understanding that
there are people, even Jews,
who can be shown at length any
form of fact and still find it with-
in themselves to hate.
Instead of pointing fmgers at
newspapers and the media and
anyone else who delivers a mes-
sage that's insulting to your
own, think of what you, your-
self, have done to carry on the
memory of those who perished
in the Shoah. If one has not
talked to his children, visited a
Holocaust museum, taught
himself or his Jewish or gentile
friends, then one cannot argue
with a front-page story. If David
Cole causes anger, then find out
why he is wrong. There is plen-
ty that Jews of any age who
aren't survivors of the Holocaust
can learn from this. Call the
ADL; call the Holocaust Muse-
um; be proactive. If nothing else
motivates us, then we need to
understand that if we're not
proactive, David Cole and his
followers certainly are. ❑

On Dec. 30, 1993,
in the city of
Jerusalem, rep-
resentatives of Is-
rael and the
Vatican signed a
historic accord to
establish diplo-
matic relations.
Behind this
agreement, lies centuries of
painful history, full of hatred,
cruelty, ignorance and persecu-
tion imposed upon the Jewish
people by the Church, relieved
only occasionally by periods of

Roman Catholic prelates in the
Vatican as we listened to Pope
John Paul II affirm the "absolute
singularity of God's choice of a
particular people, 'his own' peo-
ple, Israel." The Jewish and
Catholic leaders had met the day
before to engage in earnest and
frank dialogue on issues of pro-
found and immediate concern to
us: the alarming rise of anti-
Semitism in Eastern Europe, the
recognition by the Church of its
share of responsibility for the
Shoah, and our interest in the
transmission of the Church's

understanding and cooperation.
Thus, the recognition of Israel
by the Catholic Church is more
than a diplomatic event between
two sovereign powers. It repre-
sents a revolution in the rela-
tions of almost two thousand
years between the Catholic
church and world Jewry. Be-
yond the political aspects of the
agreement, and they are many
and far reaching, lies an even
more significant fact — the mu-
tual recognition and regard of
two ancient faiths, linked by his-
tory and common origins to one
another.
This extraordinary event had
its origin in several sources, in-
cluding the realization by the
Vatican that even Israel's former
enemies, the Palestinians, the
Jordanians and the Syrians,
were engaged directly or indi-
rectly in a peace process with Is-
rael. If Mr. Rabin could shake
hands with Mr. Arafat, what
barrier prevents the pope from
recognizing Israel? Also, the Vat-
ican itself could only be effective
in protecting its interests re-
garding the status of Christian
holy places in Jerusalem by
recognition of the Jewish state.
But I believe that another
cause helped shape the historic
signing, namely the vigorous di-
alogue which has been going on
between the Catholic Church
and representatives of the JeW-
ish people for more than a quar-
ter of a century, with which I had
some personal knowledge.
In December of 1990, I sat in
Rome with Jewish leaders and
Irwin Groner is Rabbi of Congre-
gation Shaarey Zedek and a
past president of the Rabbinical
Assembly.

new and enlightened policies
and principles to the masses of
its followers. The most critical
issue of all was the recognition
of Israel by the Vatican.
At that time, we pointed out
that the Church itself has de-
clared that no theological objec-
tions to Israel's" statehood are
acceptable, that the state has a
right to exist, and that the Israeli
ambassador in Rome, whom we
had met the day before, advised
us that he has regular contacts
with the Vatican. Why not es-
tablish diplomatic relations? We
spoke of how Jews are commit-
ted with passion to the existence
and security of the State of Is-
rael. For us, it is not merely a
political issue; it is a religious
commitment repeated daily in
our prayers, a fulfillment of mil-
lennial prophetic hopes and the
response of life to the grim fact
of the death camps. We sensed
that the Church's reluctance to
take this final step was not per-
manent and could be overcome
by patience and persistence.
Formal diplomatic recognition
of Israel has profound historical
significance. For centuries, the
Christian world has looked upon
Jews as a nation condemned to
wander without a homeland as
a punishment for their rejection
of Jesus. The recognition of Is-
rael by the Vatican means that
this pernicious perception of the
Jew is to be utterly rejected.
Some predict that this may
lead to the first visit to the Holy
Land by Pope John Paul II.
Christian spokesmen and Jew-
ish leaders have termed this
event an act of reconciliation.
We should strengthen those

.

VATICAN page 17