Editorials
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Death With Dignity
S
kepticism helps guard against over-
confidence. And it's hard to believe a
group of Detroiters can shape a home
hospice-care service in Israel, half a
world away.
The distance issue remains, and so does the
test of time, but make no mistake: we're begin-
ning to believe.
The Milton and Lois Shiffman Home Hos-
pice in the Valleys, in the central Galilee, grew
out of a trans-Atlantic dream to provide an
alternative to physician-assisted suicide.
The Detroit Jewish community and a
local university run by a Catholic order pur-
sued the dream together so terminally ill
Israelis could live out their last days with
dignity and in relative comfort. The human=
itarian thrust is to deliver specialized treat-
ment and religious chaplaincy until nature
works its course. Such care doesn't cure, but
it does ease pain.
On a typical day, the Shiffman Home serves
35 patients, 30 Jewish and five Arab. It links
the Hospice of Michigan and Madonna Univer-
sity, run by the Felician Sisters, with Detroit
Jewry's Partnership 2000_region. And it's per-
haps the biggest success of the Jewish Federa-
tion of Metropolitan Detroit-sponsored part-
nership. Federation, via the American Jewish
Joint Distribution Committee, pays the lion's
share of Shiffman's $200,000-a-year operating
budget.
Fittingly, the service preserves the memory
of Milton Shiffman. a giant of Detroit Jewry.
Simply put, he and his wife Lois saw a need
and embraced it. They Ove $100,000 to help
Detroit bring hospice care to Afula, Nazareth,
Nazareth Ilit, Migdal HaEmek and the Jezreel
Valley — a growing region of 200,000 people.
Milton Shiffman died suddenly in January,
less than two months after he and Lois hosted
many of the key players in the hospice named
for them. Lois, who shares her late husband's
compassion, hosted a similar gathering on
May 22, during a weeklong visit by Shiffman
hospice leaders.
Conceived in 1996, this fragile experiment
in the central Galilee is taking root thanks to:
• An interdisciplinary approach — building
patient care around nurses, doctors, social
workers, clergy and other professionals.
• On-site support from three of Israel's most
hospice-savvy institutions, including Hadassah
Medical Center, meaning Detroit doesn't have
to solve every crisis.
• A Madonna-developed curriculum in hospice
care, tailored to the Shiffman staff, who are
truly pioneers facing great odds.
Notably, the early success of the Milton and
Lois Shiffman Home Hospice in the Valleys
has caught the imagination of Israeli health
insurers. These insurers don't cover home hos-
pice care yet, but Kupat Cholim, the largest
HMO, pays some of Shiffman's staff costs.
Members of that staff said Monday that
they are working hard to make us here in
Detroit proud of them.
And proud we are. 0
IN FOCUS
Telling His Story
West Bloomfield residents Bradley Gonick, 12, and his mother,
Andrea Gonick, were featured speakers at the recent Anti-
Defamation League national leadership conference in Washing-
ton, D.C. They told the gathering of 500 lay and professional
leaders about their experiences with Bradley receiving more
than 1,500 antisemitic death threats on the Internet. The local
ADL office stepped in to assist the family, investigate the prob-
lem and help stop the e-mails. Above, Bradley a student at Hil-
lel Day School of Metropolitan Detroit, was a poised speaker at
the podium. Right, Bradley, with his mother, was thrilled to
meet Vice President Al Gore, who addressed the conference.
Who Said Pulling Out Would Be Easy?
I
f getting out of Lebanon was going to be easy,
Israel would have done it long ago. So this
week's seemingly inglorious retreat should not
be read as a defeat or a humiliation.
It wasn't smooth, and it wasn't pretty, but it was
necessary.
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak deserves credit
for doing what a majority of Israeli mothers and
fathers wanted — and what he promised to do a
year ago — getting Israel's soldiers out of a land
where more than 1,000 of its sons had died.
For many Americans, the pictures of Hezbollah
fighters waving their rifles in triumph evoke memo-
ries of the American pullout from South Vietnam
two decades ago, just about the time when Israel
first moved its troops across the border to try and
control PLO attacks on its northern settlements.
But the comparison is inappropriate. In Vietnam,
American troops were far from home, fighting for a
cause. In Lebanon, the IDF was safeguarding Israel's
own border, insuring that terrorist massacres of
Related story: page 19
kindergarten children and other Israeli civilians
would occur no more.
In getting out, Israel takes a calculated risk that
Syria and Lebanon will understand their responsibil-
ity to rein in Hezbollah. If they do, the evacuation
will have saved Israeli lives; if not, the battle will
continue to rage on and precious blood on both
sides of the border will continue to be spilled. But
one thing is certain: the costs in Israeli lives lost in
the Lebanese quagmire could no longer be justified
by a strategic presence that had, from a military per-
spective, become increasingly indefensible.
In the 1980s, Israel arguably could stop cross-
border attacks on its civilian populations in Kiryat
Shemona and its northern corridor by creating a
buffer zone. Now, more than 20 year later, the mist
siles in the hands of Hezbollah permit it to go right
over the IDF's head, almost at will.
In hindsight, Barak and his generals should have
foreseen the swift Collapse of the Syrian Liberation
Army and the wariness of the United Nations to
quickly fill the void — which undermined any hope
of a dignified withdrawal. Once the peace talks with
Syria stalled and Barak's July pullout crept closer, the
SLA troops had little choice but to surrender or flee.
Apparently, most wisely chose the second option.
Adding to the appearance of disarray was the
unexpected violence of the previous weekend in the
West Bank, where Palestinian protesters turned their
venting into an ugly, bloody reminder of just how
hard it is to cross that last, shaky bridge to peace.
Before we pile on Barak, we should ask ourselves
this: How many retreats (particularly of the defeat-
ed) were ever smooth and glorious?
As Israel goes down just such a bumpy road, its
shock absorbers had better be ready.
For now, Barak is at the wheel. He may not be •
the perfect navigator — as his recent policy short-
comings clearly indicate — but did anybody really
expect his road into the uncharted territories of
peacemaking with Syria, the Palestinians and
Lebanon would be without breakdowns?
Barak is actually keeping his promise, and staying
the course, in trying to make peace with Israel's
neighbors. In Israeli politics, that should count for
something. More important, he's bringing our boys
home from Lebanon. In Israeli living rooms, that
should count for even more. 0
5/26
2000
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