Editor's Notebook

Community Views

Why Days Of Decision
Is Part Of Our Lives

OneSmall Step
To Greater Miracles

PHIL JACOBS ED TOR

Pull up a chair.
You and me. We
need to have one of
our talks again.
In January of
1993 I was driving
with a friend on
the south-bound
Lodge to a Red
Wings game. We'll
call my friend Dave, and all that
I can tell you is that he lives in
this community and is probably
reading this.
Dave was a businessman. He
was doing well financially. He
had a daughter in her senior year
of high school and a son in mid-
dle school with braces on his
teeth. Dave's wife was fortunate
to be a stay-at-home mom.
During our ride, the Federa-
tion came up. And it was for most
of the miles into town that Dave
talked nothing but negative re-
garding the Federation. "It is elit-
ist," he said over and over. "It's
the same wealthy people. You
have to give $2,500 to get any
recognition."
Dave was also spouting off
about the Miracle Mission, which
was planned for April of 1993. He
openly criticized The Jewish
News for "hyping it so much." His
rationale: even though 1,300 De-
troit Jews were flying out of
Metro, making it the largest
United Jewish Appeal mission of
its type, it was still a small per-
centage of the area's Jewish pop-
ulation.
I saw Dave frequently prior to
the Miracle Mission. While I was
covering the event, I called into
The Jewish News office several
times to fax in stories from
Jerusalem and to get messages.
One of the messages I received
was from Dave. The note read
that if I could call from Israel, it
was important enough that we
make a connection.
Dave had been fired from his
job. He'd been with his compa-
ny for 21 years. There was little
in the savings account. There was
lots in the mail, lots of bills. He
did not want to tell anyone close

RABBI ARNIE SLEUTELBERG SPECIAL TO THE JEWISH NEWS

to him, not even his wife, not even
his children.
This is not a fairy tale. This
wasn't a man worried about his
mortgage. This was a person who
wasn't sure how he would tell his
wife that the check she would
write at the grocery store wasn't
backed up by anything. But that's
just the visible damage. The psy-
chological low that Dave plunged
to was personal and immeasur-
able.
I worked hard during those 10
days in Israel, and one of the rea-
sons why was so I wouldn't think
of the news coming from Farm-
ington Hills.
I thought of our discussion on
the way to the Wings game.
When the Mission returned to
Detroit, and after I awoke from
a solid day of sleeping off the jet
lag, I returned a call from Dave.
He told me that he had con-
templated suicide. That he actu-
ally sat in his car with the garage
door closed. Instead he called
Jewish Family Service. Instead
he called Jewish Vocational Ser-
vice. He got food coupons. OK, it
was embarrassing. But he got
what he needed. He told his fam-
ily. What he thought would be
disaster turned into hugs, sup-
port and "we believe in you" from
his kids.
Two years later, I think of this
story whenever I hear the old rap
against Federation. It isn't a per-
fect world in itself. Indeed, we've
read over recent months of its
challenges with its bus service,
elder care and now even the JCC.
But you should have seen
what I saw when the Partnership
2000 mayors from Israel toured
Federation agencies. Early on,
while at Fleischman Apartments,
the mayors kept asking in bro-
ken English about the "govern-
ment" facilities they were touring.
When told over and over again
that this wasn't government, but
Federation, the chatter went di-
rectly into Hebrew.
Two years later, Dave has a
good, full-time job. JVS helped
train him to get that position.

He's not making the money he
used to make, but he's happy.
And he's alive.
I think if I took that drive
along the Lodge with him now,
the talk about Federation would
be much different.
Federation calls April 2-5 its
Days of Decision. Federation
needs volunteers to man the
phones and gain pledges so that
it can complete its Allied Jewish
Campaign.
On a local funding level, Fed-
eration allocates $8.6 million to
nearly 20 agencies. The federal
government's proposed cuts could
affect several at-risk populations,
including members of our com-
munity.
There has been a partnership
between Federation social service
agencies and the government.
Cutbacks will make it difficult for
Federation to compensate. If the
Federation must allocate dollars
previously provided by the gov-
ernment for at-risk individuals
and families, other Federation
subsidies to those individual and
families as well as other funded
programs will be affected.
Federation fears cutbacks in
three major areas. They include
"Contract With America" cut-
backs in the areas of refugees, the
elderly and the disabled.
I remember Dave's words.
He now knows what Federa-
tion is and does.
"Contract With America"
means that 25 low-income De-
troit Jews could go without a hot
lunch. Could have been Dave.
Cutbacks mean that 5,000 De-
troit Jews could lose money to
pay their rent.
Volunteers are needed to per-
form clerical and phone soliciting
for Days of Decision. They are
needed April 2 from 9:30 a.m. un-
til 12:15 p.m. They are needed
April 3-5 from 6:30 p.m. to 9:30
p.m. Days of Decision will be held
at the Max M. Fisher Building.
I'm going to tell Dave. Hope-
fully he'll be there with us.

❑

Opinion

Playing The Embassy Shuffle

LEONARD FEIN SPECIAL TO THE JEWISH NEWS

T

he imminent "debate" is
over moving the American
Embassy from Tel Aviv to
Jerusalem. .
Debate? How can anyone op-
pose such a move?
Is Jerusalem not Israel's "eter-
nal and undivided capital"? Does
not every country have the right
to decide where its capital shall

be? Is not the United States oblig-
ed to respect Israel's decision?
Wouldn't the move be a fitting
element of the "Jerusalem 3000"
celebrations scheduled for 1996?
Is it not long overdue?
How can anyone but Israel's
enemies oppose it?
The truth is that most
thoughtful people in the pro-Is-

I remember
many years ago
hearing a talk by
the former may-
or of Jerusalem,
Teddy Kollek, in
which he said,
"Once presented
with a problem,
you in America
focus your minds immediately
on solving that problem. You
seem to think that every prob-
lem can be solved. We in Israel
are aware that some of our

problems, some of our major
problems, have no solutions.
"Sometimes we are aware
how to solve a problem, but we
do not have the present re-
sources to do so, because it is
not a priority. And so we go on
learning how to best live with
the problem."
I was impressed with his phi-
losophy and his candor.
Being an outdoors person —
in love with nature, hiking,
camping — I have lamented
over the years the staggering
amount of litter in Israel, both
in cities and in the wilderness.
I found it difficult to hike
with backpack for miles on
trails and see way more litter
than I could possibly stuff into
my litter bag. It was disgusting.
However, I remembered Ted-
dy Kollek's words when hiking
and realized that Israel simply
didn't have the resources in the
light of five wars, a massive in-
flux of immigrants, and a pop-
ulous for whom litter was not
an ethic because it was not a

rael camp oppose it — and wise-
ly so. The good offices of the Unit-
ed States are essential to
resolving the Israeli-Arab con-
flict, and those offices are pro-
foundly damaged if the United
States is seen as tilting too much
toward one side or the other.
There is a time and place for

Arnie Sleutelberg is rabbi of

EMBASSY SHUFFLE page 10

Congregation Shir Tikvah.

high-enough priority.
I was astounded during my
recent trip to find Jerusalem,
Tel Aviv, Ein Gedi and many
other places on my travels to be
litter-free. I do not know how
Israel did it in such a short pe-
riod of time. During my six
hours of hiking the trails of Ein
Gedi, I found not one piece of
litter anywhere. I was thank-
ful as I was reminded once
again that Israel is a land of
miracles.
I witnessed a country mov-

ing at lightning speed into the
next millennium with pride in
its achievements and confi-
dence in the challenges that lie
ahead. From no more smoking
on buses, to operational cable
TV throughout the land, to a
phone system that actually
works, to streets and trails free
of human debris, I had a sense
of pride in my homeland paral-
lel in many ways to my pride in
her pages-long list of other
miraculous achievements.
Israel is maturing. It now
has the resources to solve many
of the problems that were rec-
ognized as such for a long time,
but for which the resources
were missing until now.
Israel continues to live with
other major problems (don't we
all?) with insufficient resources
toward their solution. I contin-
ue to dream about the mes-
sianic age toward which Israel
continues to make giant strides
and feel more confidence than
ever that the many miracles
which will lead inevitably to
that Garden of Eden shall, in
fact, come to be. CI