This Week
Insight
Remember
When • • •
Beyond The Neighborhood
From the pages of the Jewish News for
this week 10, 20, 30, 40 and 50
years ago.
1991
Irnai B'rith president warns of a new
campaign against Israel and Jews.
ALAN HITSKY
Associate Editor
T
hat Israel lives in a dangerous neighborhood was
not news to Detroiters last week. But B'nai B'rith
International President Richard Heideman sum-
marized a litany of attacks on the Jewish state,
and how those attacks affect Jewish people everywhere.
"When the pope visits a mosque for the first time in
1,400 years, and the president of Syria says the Israeli-
Palestinian situation is like 'when the Jews attacked Christ'
— this is not just an attack on Israel, bu: on all the Jewish
people."
Heideman spoke May 7 at a B'nai B'rith event at Temple
Israel.
Heideman, a former Detroiter and a Washington, D.C.
attorney, said Israel's relations with Jordan are at their low-
est level in years. A Jordanian friend was recently added to
the Jordanian bar association's blacklist of attorneys who
;`collaborated" with Israel. The man has lost all his business.
The United States two weeks ago lost its seat on the United
Nations Human Rights Commission. Heideman believes the
action was taken "against the
leading human rights coun-
try in the world so that
it won't be an advocate
for Israel." Last week,
the U.S. also lost its
seat on an interna-
tional anti-drug
forum.
"Israel has been
Richard Heideman:
The drumbeat against
Israel and Jews is
increasing.
at the United Nations for 53 years," said Heideman, "but
it is the only nation that can't sit on the Security Council."
The reason: the UN's Asian group of nations, because of
its Arab members, will not accept Israel.
B'nai B'rith worked behind the scenes as a UN non-gov-
ernmental organization to get Israel accepted into the
Western European grouping, but it is still not eligible for
the Security Council.
Israel, he said, is the only nation where foreign embassies
choose not to be built in the nation's capital. U.S.
President George W Bush, however, promised Heideman a
month ago that the U.S. would move its embassy from Tel
Aviv to Jerusalem during Bush's tenure in the presidency.
B'nai B'rith will lead the largest delegation to the world
conference on racism in August in South Africa. But,
Heideman warned, the conference agenda already has a
motion to label Israel as a racist country.
"The only countries that vote for Israeli-sponsored reso-
lutions at the United Nations are United States and
Micronesia," Heideman added, warning that the drumbeat
of anti-Israel and anti-Jewish sentiment on the world stage
is again rising in the wake of the Palestinian rejection of
U.S. and Israeli peace proposals last year.
The Israeli navy stopped a Lebanese ship off Gaza on
May 7, and found hundreds of weapons, artillery pieces
and ground-to-air missiles. At the same time, Palestinian
leader Yasser Arafat's wife, Suha, told reporters that she
would have no relationships with Israeli women and she
believes there is no chance for peace.
The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine said it
will lead a holy war inside Israel's borders.
Taken together, Heideman said, these events prove that
"what Israel offered for peace" was not enough for the
Palestinians. "It is clear now that it was never going to be
enough."
To those who criticize Israel's actions in response to the
latest Palestinian iniifada, he reminds them that the United
States did not tolerate riots in Detroit, Washington and
Los Angeles. "Why should Israel tolerate riots on her bor-
ders?"
Israel is central to the Jewish people, he said. An Anti-
Defamation League survey of the general population shows
that there is a direct- correlation between the perception of
Israel as strong or weak with attacks on Jews in the diaspo-
ra.
"At B'nai B'rith," said Heideman, "we still believe it is
one of our primary missions to tell Israel's story. If we don't
speak up on Israel's behalf, our children won't know how
to do it."
He said 85 percent of young Jewish people in the U.S.
are not involved in .Jewish life, and he urged the audience
to get involved with B'nai B'rith programs to combat this
assimilation.
He said the organization's membership numbers help it
when it repressents world Jewry and Israel at the United
Nations and with 57 governments around the world.
❑
Anthony Kennedy Shriver, who
founded Best Buddies, a recreation-
al program for people with mental
retardation, was given a humanitar-
ian award from Metro Detroit's
Jewish Association for Residential
Care.
Rabbi Shlomo Goren, former
Ashkenazic chief rabbi of Israel,
refused to join an audience with
Pope John Paul II because the
Vatican did not extend diplomatic
recognition to Israel.
1981
Ivan S. Bloch of Birmingham was
named to chair the Interseas
Waterway Founders dinner spon-
sored by State of Israel Bonds.
Sondra Nathan was installed as pres-
ident of the Greater Detroit Section,
National Council-of Jewish Women.
1971
Lag b'Omer was commemorated in
the U.S. House of Representatives
when Rabbi Chaim Lipschitz of
Brooklyn delivered the opening prayer.
Detroiter Becky Goldberg was
installed as president of Detroit
Council of Pioneer Women.
1961
A memorial plaque was affixed to a
Paris building in which Theodor Herzl
wrote some of his works influencing
the creation of the State of Israel.
Detroiter Neil Cohen, a junior at
the University of Michigan, was
named general chair of the annual
homecoming.
1951
The first high school class to be
graduated from Temple Israel in its
new building is also the largest class
in the Detroit temple's history: 26
members.
R. Wishnievitz, director of Karen
Hayesod of Mexico, was re-elected
president of the Zionist Organiza-
tion of Mexico.
Jewish War Veteran units planned
a tribute to honor Dorothy Brown,
Department of Michigan president.
—Compiled by Sy Manello,
editorial assistant,'
5/18
2001
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