4DITOR'S WATCH

Deciding What To Print Provides
Revealing Peek Into World Jewry

turn it over to the Jewish Historical
art of my job is to review
Society of Southern California for use as
what's on the daily electronic
a historical museum, small synagogue
log of the Jewish Telegraphic
and community-service center. Movie
Agency (JTA), a New York
mogul Louis B. Mayer was first presi-
City-based wire service. What I typically
dent of the Orthodox shul, founded in
look for are informative, balanced, time-
1923. At the time, the neighborhood
ly stories with a national or global per-
was dubbed the Lower East Side of Los
spective for our World pages.
Angeles. It was home to
Limits on space prevent us
90,000 Jews. When residents
from running everything that
began to moved to the tonier
boasts news value. And that's
west side and San Fernando
unfortunate because many
Valley in the 1940s, the shul
good stories never make it into
fell into disrepair. Vandals
print. Often, it comes down to
trashed the sanctuary and
a gut feeling about which sto-
earthquakes threatened to
ries will have broad appeal.
collapse it entirely.
Sometimes, we'll choose to
*Mayor Yuri Luzhkov
localize a JTA story and run it
joined hundreds of Moscow
ROB ERT A.
Up Front or in Business or
Jews at the rededication of a
S KLAR
Living Well.
synagogue bombed in May.
Ed itor
Here's a patchwork sampler
The Marina Roscha Syna-
of some of the more-intriguing
gogue was renovated thanks
JTA stories I've come across recently:
to an unusual alliance of city officials,
• Torahs don't come cheap. New
local businesses, foreign donors and
ones, available primarily from scribes,
"ordinary Muscovites eager to help with
carry a price tag of $25,000 to $35,000.
their $2 or $3," said Rabbi Berel Lazar.
Used ones sell for $5,000 to $15,000. A
Shockingly, the Lubavitch synagogue
small, new congregation with little cash
was bombed within minutes of 70 chil-
either borrows a scroll from another
dren and their teachers leaving the
synagogue or seeks a Torah donor. The
three-story building after celebrating
size of the scroll and the condition of
Lag B'Omer. Damage was estimated at
the parchment heavily influence the
$100,000. No arrests were made.
price.
• The Knesset defeated two bills
• The Los Angeles City Council,
aimed at imposing a military draft on
momentarily setting aside more pressing
fervently Orthodox yeshiva students.
matters of the day, saved the Breed
Military deferments for yeshiva students
Street Shul, once the focal point of a
have become a highly charged issue in
thriving Jewish community. The city
the deepening rift between Israel's secu-
will acquire the 75-year-old shul and
lar and observant populations. The

want to tell you how delighted we were
to read the insightful articles on the
Jewish servicemen's involvement in the
Civil War ("Weekend Warriors" July 3).
I am certain that many of your
readers were truly surprised to learn
the extent of the Jewish military in
these conflicts.
As you already know, it was because
of the many Jewish servicemen in the
Civil War that the Jewish War Veterans
organization was born. When, 30 years
after the Civil War, still much of the
nation had no knowledge of the Jewish
Civil War veterans, those veterans felt it
was time to form an organization that
would help counteract the rumors that
Jewish people did not fight for their
country; that is still the basic role of our
organization. The Jewish War Veterans
is the oldest active chartered veterans
group chartered by Congress.

Very few people are aware, for
example, not only were there almost
10,000 Jewish servicemen in the Civil
War, but there were also 10,000 Jew-
ish servicemen in the recent Gulf War.
Those of us from World War II, Korea
and Vietnam eras are very much aware
of the 550,000 Jewish personnel in
those conflicts.
The story needs to be told so that
non-Jews change their stereotypes of
Jews and so Jewish people can take
pride in knowing that Jewish men and
women stand shoulder to shoulder with
non-Jews in defense of their country.
Our thanks and congratulations to
The Jewish News for helping us to
carry the message about our Jewish
servicemen to keep it from remaining
the nation's best kept secret.

.

Robert W. Feldman
Commander, Jewish War Veterans

the $14 million, granite-and-marble
deferments were first granted in the
building. Jewish commitment to the
early 1950s under Prime Minister
project is noteworthy because only
David Ben-Gurion. At the time, they
30,000 of the 500,000 Jews in Moscow
applied to 500 yeshiva students. Now,
are affiliated with a synagogue, said Pin-
28,000 men between 18 and 41 have
chas Goldschmidt, the Russian capital's
been granted exemptions after claiming
chief rabbi.
their only occupation is yeshiva studies.
• When he drove from Boston to
Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu
Albany
as a Massachusetts Institute of
opposed the bills. Interestingly, Arab
Technology student,
lawmakers voted
Simon Cohen would
against the bills in
hear a click as his car
exchange for a
wheels rolled over the
promise from the reli-
tiny cracks separating
gious parties to
the concrete blocks
oppose any move to
along the interstate.
impose any form of
Those
clicks inspired
national service on
him
to
develop a
Israel's Arab commu-
computerized
system
nity.
to
enforce
traffic
laws
Russian
Jewish
•
and, hopefully, save
leaders planning a
lives in Israel, where
Holocaust center of
more than 500 peo-
their own in Moscow
ple die each year in
hope to spark a
car wrecks. The
renewal of cultural
patented system
pride within the Jew-
works by embedding
ish community,
two sensors in the
which still endures
road a yard apart and
sometimes violent
linking them to a
expressions of anti-
A synagogue looking for a new
police-station com-
Semitism. More than
Torah can commission a scribe by
traveling to Israel or by surfing the puter. A speeding
1 million of the 20
vehicle is caught on
World Wide Web.
million Russians who
camera from the rear,
died in World War II
with the license plate in clear view. A
were targeted for extermination by the
ticket is then issued. Cohen's innovation
Nazis. The center's co-developers, the
received a financial boost from The
Russian Jewish Congress and the Ameri-
Technion-Israel
Institute of Technology's
can Jewish Joint Distribution Commit-
tee, said donations from the Russian
PRINT on page 34
Jewish community will cover the cost of

Is It Reporting
Or Opinion?

One sensitive to the nuances of sub-
jective reporting cannot but help won-
der about James Besser's latest work
on the John K. Roth fiasco ("Under
Fire, Roth Resigns" from the U.S.
Holocaust Museum, July 3 issue).
For some reason, Besser neglected
to mention the work of Morton Klein,
president of the Zionist Organization
of America, forcing the withdrawal of
Roth as a director of the Holocaust
Memorial Center for Advanced Holo-
caust Studies. Previously in his
columns, Besser was all over Klein.
Besser all but declared, in his criti-
cism, that Klein was the reincarnation
of Joseph McCarthy! Abraham Fox-
man of the Anti-Defamation League,

another ardent and perennial Klein
critic, also jumped on the anti-Klein
bandwagon.
Now, suddenly the worm has turned.
Klein and his research staff uncovered
scores of previous bizarre statements
and stupefying conclusions by Professor
Roth. Klein also garnered the support
of Holocaust scholars Professor Alvin
Rosenfeld, Professor Emil Fackheimer,
Professor Harry Jaffa, Congressman
Michael Forbes and Jon Fox, Neal Sher
formerly of American Israel Public
Affairs Committee, George Will, John
Podhoretz and many others. Despite
this representation of irrefutable evi-
dence and distinguished support, Besser
glaringly neglected to mention the work
of Klein in his latest summation.
Instead, two paragraphs are allocated to
quotes by Abe Foxman who, also, pm-
dently reversed his field.

7/17
1998

3