No War, No Peace
Jerusalem (JTA) --- Hundreds of
Palestinians marched through a
r efugee camp in the Gaza Strip
ing on Iraqi leader Saddam
Hussein to launch missiles on Tel
Aviv.
The Palestinian Authority
imposed a ban on pro-Iraqi
demonstrations, but the ban has
been widely ignored. A similar
demonstration organized by Pales
tinian Authority Chairman Yassir
Arafat's own Al Fatah faction was
held in the West Bank town of
Hebron.
There is a lot of
o p criticism in Israel
of the war that
never was.
LARRY DERFNER
Israel Correspondent
.,. ._
s soon as Kofi Annan
announced that he had an
agreement, the criticism in
Israel against the establish-
ment's handling of the "war" began to
fly.
The establishment in Israel, no mat-
ter who's running the government,
dependably comes under domestic fire
for botching this matter or that. But the
accusations this time took an unusual
tack.
Israeli society, from the leadership to
the grassroots, is notorious for compla-
cency. Israelis' talent for improvisation is
the flip side of their inability to plan
ahead. Yihyeh b'seder — it'll be all right
— is the national motto, so problems
are neglected, and sometimes they
develop into disasters. The Yom Kippur
War, the intifada, the Rabin assassina-
tion, the Mossad's recent failure in
Amman — all occurred, to a greater or
lesser degree, because Israeli political
and military leaders were overconfident.
This time, though, the thrust of the
criticism was that it had been overly
cautious in the face of a minuscule
threat.
The three weeks leading up to the
all-clear sign had not been a happy
time. Hundreds of thousands of people
had waited in line for hours and some-
times even days to get gas masks. Hard-
ware stores had been swamped with
crowds buying nylon sheeting and
masking tape for their sealed rooms.
Hotels in Eilat, at the southern tip of
the country, were overbooked with
Israelis planning to get out of Saddam's
line of fire. Flights leaving for Europe
were likewise filled up.
Government agencies had sat and
discussed how to evacuate cities in the
event that anthrax-loaded missiles
exploded in their midst. Mourning
A
Pa
Demonstrate
Americans:
Avoid Travel
Jerusalem (JTA) — The U.S. State
Department advised Americans to
avoid traveling to the Palestinian
self-rule areas. The statement cited
the pro-Iraq demonstrations that
have been occurring there on a
near-daily basis.
The statement said there was a
low probability that Iraq would
launch a missile attack on Israel,
but added, 'Given the current
• tensions in the region, the U.S.
believes it is s impor-
tant for all citizens to maintain
readiness in the unlikely event of
an emergency
Anniversary For
Wiesen.thal Center
Soldiers answer hotline calls regarding gas mask distribution.
notices for the dead were printed up
with blanks left for the names in case
they had to be filled in. Tens of thou-
sands of public-sector employees had
devoted their time almost exclusively to
emergency preparations. The overall
cost to the taxpayer came to about $100
million.
In the end, all the tension and frantic
effort seemed to have been for nothing.
Israelis were embarrassed at how the
nation had behaved. A three-week
build-up of stress was released at once.
It was time to settle accounts with the
officials responsible.
The blame, naturally, came mainly
from the Labor Party-led opposition
and the media. Labor accused the gov-
ernment of "defeatism, uncertainty, star-
ding inefficiency and lack of credibility
throughout the crisis with Iraq."
Israel's leading newspaper columnist,
Nachum Barnea of Yediot Achronot,
wrote that the government was motivat-
ed chiefly by "fear of a future commis-
sion of inquiry that might arise" if the
missiles fell and caught the country
unprepared. Netanyahu, wrote Barnea,
Los Angeles (JTA) — The Los
Angeles-based Simon Wiesenthal
Center's Museum of Tolerance
marked its fifth anniversary by
unveiling a $1.4 million multime-
dia and interactive exhibit,
Visitors enter a replica of a
1950s diner, with counter stools
and red booths, where they can
view two different videos: one
probing the boundary between
free speech and hate speech, the
other dealing with moral choices
and attitudes related to a fatal
drunk driving accident. After each
presentation, viewers can ask pre-
programmed questions of the
film's characters, then vote their
personal rea.aions.
2/27
1998
37