Israel is wracked by violence.
To combat that, they have gone on
the offensive.
The New York City Council urged
the government to lift the warning as
did a delegation of six American may-
ors who traveled to Israel last month
on a trip sponsored by the American
Jewish Congress.
On Tuesday, the Conference of
Presidents of Major American Jewish
Organizations issued a rare kol koreh
— a clarion call — urging American
Jews to reaffirm their solidarity with
Israel, ignore the travel warning, and
visit the country.
Malcolm Hoenlein, executive vice
chairman of the Presidents
Conference, said he would continue to
lobby State Department officials to
"see our point of view, and define" the
warning "rather than leaving it so gen-
eral." He concedes, however, that the
Nov. 22 bombing of a bus in the
northern Israeli town of Hadera hurt
the claim that the violence is generally
confined to the territories. Three
weeks earlier, a terrorist bomb explod-
ed in the heart of Jerusalem, and the
Jerusalem neighborhood of Gilo has
been fired upon almost nightly.
The warning — not to mention the
bloodshed itself — has derailed what
was expected to be a record-breaking
year for Israeli tourism, said Arie
Sommer, Israeli commissioner for
tourism for North America.
The Jewish state was expecting more
than 3 million tourists — one fifth of
them American — this year, but 70
percent of all trips planned for
October through December have been
canceled, Sommer said.
The desperation was reflected by the
Israeli manager of Kfar Kedem, a recre-
ated mishnaic-era village in the Galilee,
who recently wrote an open letter to
American Jewish communities.
"I look around me today and the
beauty of the Galilee is at its peak fol.,
lowing the first rains," Menachem
Goldberg wrote. "Our sheep are grazing
on the fresh grass while our herd of don-
keys idle in their sheds. The olive press
remains still and the threshing floor is
vacant.
"And where are the tourists?"
Goldberg asked American Jews.
"Where is the real 'Partnership 2000'
now that we need you? And where is the
dignity and courage of the American
Jewish community that is not frightened
away by the propaganda broadcast daily
on CNN [Cable News Networld?
"We don't need solidarity missions
to Gilo or angry letters to the New
York Times. We need you!"
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