.EDITOR'S NOTEBOOK
Myopia Extends Beyond The Serbs
memory of the Six Million.
We dishonor our own
humanity, the Judaism we
0
0.
supposedly profess and the
God to whom we pray.
If Jewish martyrs are the
only ones who matter, then
we have crossed over. We have
A radical, independent
validated the rationale of the
Listen to a few quotes
Kosovo could be a hotbed
Serbs, the Nazis, the Khmer
gathered over the last week
for radical fundamentalists
Rouge, the IRA, the Palestin-
from national and local news-
and therefore a threat to
ian terrorists, the Inquisition
papers:
Israel.
and
the Crusades.
— Israeli Foreign Minister
"Terrible things are happen-
Have we learned nothing
Ariel Sharon
ing in Kosovo ... but they are
as Jews? Have we learned
Ethnic Albanians fled Kosovo by the thousands.
not the Holocaust."
nothing from the Holo-
Serbian forces were posi-
"Jewish pleas [during the
caust?
tioning tanks and artillery
Holocaust] fell on deaf ears.
the United States of America and
I
will
never
forgive, nor forget, that a
ALAN HITSKY along the Kosovo border
Nobody seemed to have
dozens of other places where, in this
rabbi
in
this
community
wrote an essay
(with Albania) today,
Associate Editor
cared, but today we hear the
century, other people have been killed
in
this
newspaper
(and
some
rabbis in
just one day after tens of
plight of refugees of Kosovo
because — and only because — they
other
communities
wrote
similar
essays)
thousands of refugees van-
is worthy of our assistance
were different from their killers.
condoning
Baruch
Goldstein's
murder-
ished when the Serbs turned their
and America takes action."
The reason could be their religion,
ing 29 Arab worshippers in a mosque in
convoys back from the border.
"It hurts us to see the present regime
it could be their skin color or it could
the Cave of Machpelah in Hebron.
— New York Times
in Yugoslavia, but we should always
be their language. In the end, the vic-
I was so ashamed. To condone that
remember the Serbian people because
tims were guilty of being different.
kind
of action validates the Milosevic
Monday night, erev Yom HaShoah, I
they were the exception [during the
Yes,
the
Holocaust,
in
sheer
size
of
today,
the Hitler of yesterday and
placed my memorial candle in my liv-
Holocaust]."
and
scope,
was
the
greatest
human
anyone
who
kills innocent men,
ing room window. As I lit the yellow
— Rabbi Charles Rosenzveig, direc-
tragedy of this century. But should
women
and
children
in the name of
candle — with its Star of David out-
tor of the Holocaust Memorial Center
that
fact
blind
Jews
to
similar
some
cause.
lined in barbed wire — I said my own
in West Bloomfield
tragedies? Should we close our eyes
That's not the kind of Torah,
little prayer for the millions of innocent
400,000 Kosovars have
only
because
Judaism
or Jewish People that I want
Jews who died in the Holocaust.
"Kosovo is holy to the Serbs. It would
only thou-
been
uprooted
and
because
to
believe
in.
I remembered the aunts, uncles and
be similar to forcing the Jews to give
sands
of
them
have
been
killed?
cousins I never met, and thought of
up Jerusalem.
Is this the lesson we are supposed
friends and neighbors who, until they
— A Detroit-area Serb American
To leave a voice-mail message for
to
learn
from the Holocaust?
die, carry a German tattoo on their arms
Alan
Hitsky, call (248) 354-
When we let our own grief tran-
and unspeakable grief in their hearts.
What is occurring in Kosovo is not at
ext. 259, or e-mail
6060,
scend someone else's, when we turn
And I thought of Kosovo and
all like the Holocaust, but there is a
ahltsky@thejewishnews.com
inward instead of trying to help those
Bosnia, Cambodia and Lebanon,
human tragedy."
facing similar horrors, we dishonor the
Ethiopia, Northern Ireland, Armenia,
"If only the world cared about Jews 55
he photographs, the sound
bites, the interviews from
the Balkans are starting to
get to me, but not as much
as the comments I read and hear in
the United States.
years ago as it cares about those in
Kosovo."
— Dr. Charles Silow, founder and
president of CHAIM, Children of
Holocaust-survivors Association In
Michigan
O
❑
)1
Yizkor
When fleeting time
will draw the curtain
over the eyes, and death
will silence the lips
of the last witness
to testify the horrid crimes
of Nazi murderers,
Yizkor, you remember.
When torrent rains and drifting
clods will erase the lines
of the graves with molding bones
buried by Nazi executioners,
Yizkor, you remember.
When the barbwire in the weeds
will rust, the guard towers,
the gas chambers with the ovens
where millions perished by the hands
of Nazi henchmen will crumble to dust,
Yizkor, you remember.
When grass will grow thick
over the ash pits of millions of chil-
dren
burned in Sobibor, Auschwitz
by their Nazi executioners,
that dastardly deed never to forgive!
Yikzor, remember them! Never forget!
Charles Lukacs
Southfield
Mixed Signals
Being Sent
People of color who are active in com-
batting the evils of racism and anti-
Semitism are really disturbed and con-
fused about the mixed signals emerg-
ing from some parts of the Jewish
community.
Some voices in the Jewish com-
munity resent any comparison with
"their Holocaust story" and many
have rejected any usage of the term
holocaust when one invokes the
comparison. Others actually attack
those who dare to suggest other
holocausts have occurred in the his-
tory of mankind.
Recently, Elie Wiesel, in his column
in Newsweek, went to great lengths to
distance the Yugoslavia madness as a
holocaust. Some even in the Jewish
community were offended by those
who define the treatment of American
Indians on these shores as a domestic
holocaust.
Certainly those of us who champi-
on human rights must be allowed to
articulate and communicate as best we
can the evils of all holocausts as we
continue to battle the evils of hate in
our world.
Greg Thrasher
West Bloomfield
U.N. Debts
And Voting
Recent news reports suggest that the
United States risks losing its U.N.
General Assembly vote because of a
failure to pay U.N. arrears.
Potentially losing the right to vote in
the General Assembly is indeed a serious
matter, but the U.S. is already suffering
a heavy price in terms of prestige and
political clout at the world body due to
its shameful debtor status.
The situation was glaringly evident
during a recent visit by representatives
of the American Jewish Committee to
the U.N. complex in Geneva, the cen-
ter of a broad range of international
agencies involved in economic, social
and humanitarian work. Clearly there,
as in New York, the U.S. capacity to
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Detroit Jewish News
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