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The Power Of Persuasion
A former Ethiopian revolutionary propagandist
seeks representation for his people in the Knesset
Jerusalem
Fear And Ridicule
When Ethiopians move into a neighborhood, other Israelis begin to move
out for fear their property values will diminish. For in Israel, the term
"Ethiopian" is synonymous with low-class.
Consequently, Ethiopian immigrants have fewer and fewer veteran Is-
raeli neighbors, their children have fewer and fewer veteran Israeli class-
mates. Call it "white flight, Israeli-style."
For all the assistance given Ethiopians in the army, many are ill-equipped
to cope with the harsh, cutting behavior that is the way of life in uni-
form. Not a few junior officers, instructors and soldiers have been known
to laugh at Ethiopians when they don't understand, to imitate their high-
pitched voices and broken Hebrew. Some even call them "kushi," a deroga-
tory term that ranks with the worst of racial put-downs.
There are numerous stories of Ethiopian immigrant soldiers falling into
depression when predatory comrades turn them into camp flunkies. The
United Ethiopian Jewish Organizations says 20 Ethiopian immigrant sol-
diers have committed suicide in the last two years; the army says the cor-
rect figure is four.
But beyond the religious discrimination, creeping segregation and of-
ddisu Messale, who will run in the Labor Party's primaries
for a seat on its Knesset, is a most unusual candidate,
even by Israeli standards, He was raised an observant
Jew in a village in Gondar Province in Ethiopia. But
he shed leis religiosity at age 16, when he left home to
join the Ethiopian Revolutionary Party — democ-
ratic socialist guerrillas, he says they were, fight-
ing the Mengistu Communist dictatorship.
Mr. Messale headed the party's "Red Agitators" propaganda sec-
tion. "I have tremendous persuasive powers," he says in self-evalu-
ation. "Whenever somebody else from the Party was speaking to a
crowd, the people would ask, Where's
Add i sur
After a few years, the rebels start-
ed fighting each other, and those who
surrendered were soon executed by
Mengistu's forces. Mr. Messale es-
caped to Sudan, where he nearly died
from months of starvation and expo-
sure to the African desert sun. "A few
times I wanted to commit suicide," he
says, but he made it to the capital
Khartoum with a plan to get political
asylum in England or the United
States.
There supposedly was no passage
from Sudan to Israel, but he ran into
a Jew from his Gondar village and
joined him over the next year in spir-
iting 2,000 Ethiopian Jews through
Mr. Messale
Sudan to the Jewish state. In 1980, Mr. Messale
himself left for Israel; his mother, father and nine older brothers and
sisters came later.
Over the years, Mr. Messale organized protests, usually over re-
ligious discrimination against Ethiopian Jews. In 1990, Israel's Ethiopi-
an immigrant organizations merged and Mr. Messale was chosen
chairman. Although he studied mechanical engineering at Ben-Gu-
rion University and got a degree in community social work at Bar-
Ilan University, he says, "The Ethiopian Revolutionary Party was
my real university. That's where I learned how to organize, how to
win attention for the movement, how to convince people."
With his socialist background, Mr. Messale signed up with the La-
bor Party shortly after arriving in Israel. In the primaries, he -will
compete for the p s "immigrant's seat" two relative
known Russians.
Recently, he says, Israeli Labor secretary-general Nissim Zvi li
asked him to withdraw his candidacy. The reason was mathemati:-
cal -- there are about 600,000 Russian immigrants and only 60,000
Ethiopian ones, and Labor wants to attract the Russian voters. Mr.:-
Zvili didn't succeed in his mission. "There is no way I'm getting out
of the race," Mr. Messale says.
There will be other party emissaries coming to lean on him. But as
willful and persuasive as they may be, these veteran Israeli poli.ti
cians will have nothing on the former Red Agitator from Gondar.