a Eighty-Seven Years of Editorial Freedom 420 Maynard St., Ann Arbor, MI 48109 Palestinians in the occupied territory Wednesday, March 23, 1977 News Phone: 764-0552 Edited and managed by students at the University of Michigan it is time to put the AFSCME strike behind us S OF THIS afternoon, 27 mem- bers of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Em- ployes (AFSCME) have been suspend- ed for "misconduct" in the strike. We feel the choice made by ad- ministrators to seek out, prosecute and "eliminate" employes is unfortu- nate. The suspension of these workers will only prolong the ill feelings as- sociated with the 26-day strike. Such actions certainly will not bring the already disillusioned University em- ployes any added security. All of the persons in danger of being discharged were involved in "serious misconduct," the administra- tion claims. They are cited for slash- ng tires and breaking windshields on University vehicles, malicious van- dalism and in some cases assault' on University personnel. We agree that these activities are beyond what might necessarily be considered "obedient" picketing, and The Daily idoes not condone any of these actiities, at any time. But, as we have said here before, the time has come to forgive and for- get. The University must realize that those strikers involved in overzealous activities were under a great deal of pressure, not only from their peers, but from their families. These peo- ple hadn't been paid in weeks, mon- ey was scarce, and they had a lot to be angry about. To the workers, the University was entirely at fault. If administrators are going to punish strikers, why not look at the other side of the picture? What about all of the police who overreacted and attacked pickets? Don't they de- serve to be disciplined, too? What about the University's Chief Negotia- tor, who one day decided to hop be- hind the wheel of a laundry truck (even though he isn't licensed to drive one) and who ended up run- ning down a union member with it. Why isn't he being suspended? And what of all the supervisors who ille- gally drove University trucks? What is happening to them? THE UNFORTUNATE truth is that administrators can iow take out their frustrations and vengeance on a few workers who happened to be caught up in the insanity of the mo- ment. Still another case is to be made for student workers, who, after hav- ing the guts to skip a few days work in honor of the AFSCME cause, were notified that their "unexcused ab- sences" had prompted supervisors to give their jobs to someone else. Even worse than this, not all of the student sympathizers were fired, only those who had been at the fore- front in organizing student support for the strike. How ironic that a University which preaches student involvement and en- courages them to take sides in pub- lic issues should can anyone who takes their advice. Student workers should not be punished for expressing their views, no matter which side 'they end up on. At least AFSCME employes who are suspended have a chance to fight their punishment in arbitration, but students have no chance to save their jobs. The administration is fighting a little below their class. The AFSCME strike was a dismal mar on this academic year, and the time has come to end the whole mess. Actions taken in the heat of the battle will not reflect on the performance of those workers now that they are back on the job, and it seems best to put this matter be- hind us. By T. D. ALLMAN Second of Five Parts IN THE TWO Palestinian villages of Bardala and Tel el Beida, the long Arab-Israeli conflict is one of neither grand geopolitical principal nor recondite detail. It is simply a problem afflicting human beings. Just a few years ago, the most significant thing about these two villages - located in the central Jordan River valley near what until 1967 was the West Bank's northern boundary with Israel - was that, in spite of four Arab-Israeli wars, the thousand or so villagers had made some progress. At Tel el Beida a modern irrigation system had doubled the crop yields. At Bardala, the villagers had constructed a municipal water system that piped drink- ing water to each household. Now, the irrigation system at Tel el Beida is a ruin of dusty culverts. At Zardala the pipers are dry, and the village women, as in the days of Turkish rule, once again walk nearly a kilometer to fetch drinking water and then laboriously carry it back to their houses. THE SOURCE of their misfortune is the nearby Medah cooperative farm: a new Israeli §ettlement of modern housing surrounded by high fences where 30 families now live. A year after the Israeli army swept through the area, Israeli engineers surveyed the two Palestinian villages. Then, in violation of Jordanian law - which Israel as the occupying power is obliged by the Geneva convention to respect - the Israelis drilled a new and deeper well only a few yards from the Palestinian well. The villagers complained to the military govern- ment. but to no avail. The Israelis not only denied them permission to drill an artesian well to compensate for their lost water but refused to sell them water from the Israeli settlement. SUCH SITUATIONS are far from rare a decade after Gen. Moshe Dayan told his troops: "Soldiers of the Israeli Defense Forces, we do not aim at conquest." The Israelis have established some 84 settlements in Arab territories occupied in 1967, according to Ameri- can Friends Service Committee figures. Under Israeli occupation, the Arab population of the Golan Heights seized from Syria has been reduced from 130 000 to 13 285. As a result of Israeli policy in lands seized from Jordan, some 200,000 Palestinians have been forced to emigrate to foreign countries. Even within the densely populated Gaza strip, where nearly 450 000 Palestinians are compressed into an area of 120 square miles, the Israelis have confis- cated nearly 100,00 acres and established four Jewish settlements. IN THE HIGHLANDS above the Jordan valley the new Allon Road runs the length of Samaria through lands from which all traces of Palestinian settlement are being systematically eradicated. Palestinian cis- terns have been sealed. Palestinian croplands have been defoliated or transferred to Israeli settlers. Since 1967, in fact, the Israelis have confiscated some 80 per cent of the arable land abutting the West Bank of the Jordan River. Along the highway running north from Jericho toward Galilee, where Palestinian fields once bloomed, the Israelis have created a desert. One passes dozens of dismantled irrigation stations and miles of fences bar- ring the Palestinian population from lands they once cultivated. Andre w} For the Palestinians, such systematic destruction of Arab farmlands is a clear sign of Israeli intentions. They believe the Israelis are not merely seeking military security but creating political conditions in which the Palestinians will be unable to establish a viable state of their own. "I HAVE SEEN the Israelis watch a farmer double his output," a U.S.-trained development expert said. "and then seize half his land. Their aim is to keep the Palestinians an impoverished people." In the Jordan valley village of El Makhruk, a Palestinian farmer pointed to the Israeli barbed wire and desolate fields beyond. "They have taken away three-quarters of what my fatier willed to me," he said. "I fear my sons will be landless laborers, forced to wander strange lands." At Bardala, a Palestinian landowner pointed to the Israeli well. "No guns are being fired." he said, "but the Israelis are making war on our right to live. We could dismantle their well some night," he continued, "but then the soldiers would come. They would deport our elders and imprison our sons. They would tell the world the terrorists have struck again." EARLY THIS YEAR Israeli Foreign Minister Yigal Allon ordered intensified Israeli settlement of the oc- cupied territories' If the Allon plan were implemented, the lands left to the Palestinians - whether they formed an inde- pendent state or were linked to Jordan - would. com- prise three small, truncated regions: Samaria, Judea and Gaza, all largely or entirely cut .off from each oth- er, hedged in on all sides by Israeli troops, guns and barbed wire. DUAL STANDARD Palestinian suspicions are inflamed not only by Israeli policy, but by what they consider an unending pattern of Israeli provocations. In the Gaza Strip, where the population density exceeds 4.000 persons per square mile, Israelis have been permitted not only to establish businesses em- ploying cheap Paletinian labor, but to live there if they wish. BUT PALESTINIAN laborers working in Israeli territory are not permitted to live where they work. Instead, they must spend many hours daily traveling to and from the Jewish areas. The Palestinians of Gaza are obliged to pay Israeli taxes. but they do not receive Israeli social benefits. And, while Israeli products are allowed free entry into the Occupied Territories, Palestinian products are not permitted to compete with Israeli goods inside Israel. Such Israeli policies - not just in Gaza but through- ot the occupied territories - have produced an ironic result. Designed to make the Palestinian populatic' more pliable, they instead have helped to radicalize local politics and win for the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) a degree of support it did not en- joy before 1967. "If there is any complaint against (PLO head) Yas- ser Arafat, it is that he is too moderate," a Palestinian journalist recently observed. WHEN ISRAEL permitted West Bank elections a year ago as required by the Geneva convention, candi- dates who openly supported the PLO won every contest - even though several of the most popular West Bank leaders were under political detention and one likely winner was deported before the vote was held. And in Gaza, where demands for elections even by the conservative Israeli-appointed ,mayor Rashad El-Shawa were denied by the Israeli government, no one now disputes that free elections would produce an overwhelming victory for the PLO. Late last year, the Israeli military governor of Gaza, Brig. Gen. David Maimon, outlined plans for the future of the strip. Whether or not Israel ultimately withdrew from Gaza, Gen. Maimon said, the strip would be surrounded by fortified Israeli settlements, including a number established in former Egyptian territory. GAZA WOULD BE denied any territorial contact with other Arab.territory, and its population would be permanently quarantined from the surrounding Arab lands. Any possibility of the Gazans ever returning to the lands from which they had fled, or receiving com- pensation for property lost to the Israelis, was cate- gorically excluded. Gaza, an American official stationed there later commented, "is a place where one's nose is constantly being rubbed in the dirt. Periodically, the Israelis pick up one of my employes and make an example of him, just to show the Palestinians they cannot look to the international relief agencies for protection. The last time they took one of my employes, they tortured him by forcing his own shoe down his throat." 'INMATES OF GAZA' For many Palestinians, water-starved villages like Bardala. and the defoliated farmlands along the Jordan, conjure up a future in which, as a Palestinian agri- cultural expert employed by a U.S. relief agency put it "We will all become inmates of Gaza strips, if the Israelis have their way." "The Palestinians complain all the time," re- marked Medah Cooperative member Hillel Wiseberg. "They forget all their progress is .due to us. This is our land." he added. "We will never give it back." But Wiseberg, who emigrated to Israel from Brit- ain, acknowledged that this was the first time he had heard of his neighbors' water problem. And he freely conceded that in eight years there he never had entered either Palestinian village, never taken a meal with a Palestinian and never engaged in prolonged conver- sation with any of his non-Jewish neighbors. LATER, ONLY a few hundred yards away, a Christian Palestinian pointed to the parched fields' around him and said, "It is a very old Jewish policy. The Israelis are doing here what they did in my grandfather's time in Jaffa." Then, referring to a text as old as Moses, he sum- med up the fate that now haunts all Palestinians, wherever they live, by reciting from memory the 23rd chaoter of Exodus: I will not drive them out from before thee in one year: lest the land become desolate and the beasts of the field multiply against thee. By little and little I will drive them out before thee, until thou be increased, and inherit the land. * * * TOMORROW: The Palestinians in Israel. Dr. Allman is a freelance Journalist who often writes for the Pacific News Service. Wvn man ng "we need you in from off the cuff. Young's Young, however, de- statements are the frank opin- o pass up the oppor- ions of a man who does not ad- here to the old diplomatic rule d not abandon the of never saying what you real- movement for the ly think. What he did was Young will undoubtedly con- e civil rights strug- tinuesto be frank, open, and international stage, honest. It's a refreshing, far just for America's cry from the one-man show of for blacks in white- Henry Kissinger, the separation esia and South Afri- of morality from foreign policy, ng says, racism, not and traditional diplomacy. Of i, is the major prob- course, there is that one ad- thern Africa. vantage in the multi-ring fore- his outspokenness, ign policy show - Andrew sador has not yet Young is not the sole spokes- d on the carpet" for man for America in foreign untimely comments. affairs. He is one man expres- Carter himself has sing one man's convictions. ed up the style of call "off the cuff" Keith B. Richburg is a Daily But Andrew Young's cartoonist, who often writes nments, ill - timedc to itorofte y may be, are far for the Editorial page. Teenagers need to obtain good birth control service OL MONDAY, Rep. Perry Bullard (D- Ann Arbor) introduced a bill in the state House which would make family planning services and contra- ceptives available to teen-agers, and it's about time. One out of every five babies is born to a teen-ager, yet a Federal District Court judge - apparently unaware of this problem' - ruled earlier this month that parents must be consulted before their children are given birth control services. What good can a ruling like that possibly do? It is an attempt to keep our young people "pure," and it is an extension of an old belief that only bad, immoral, or degenerate teens would have sevual relations. But those days are gone, if they ever existed at all. Planned Parenthood reports that one-fourth of all 14-year-old girls are sexually active, and that is a fact that we simply can't continue to ig- nore. Without debating the point of whether or not it is "right" 'to en- gage in teen-age, pre-marital sex, all of us - parents, legislators, religious leaders, and moralists of all sorts -. must recognize that this kind of ac- tivity is going on, and we can't stop it. Teen-agers are, and will continue to be sexually active, and the best thing we can do is minimize the risk of an unwanted pregnancy. An unwanted pregnancy doesn't do anyone any good, especially 'if the parents are teen-agers. Not only can it ruin their lives, but it is an unhealthy situation to thrust a baby into. It would take exceptional ma- turity to raise a child decently un- der those conditions, so it can ruin the life of the child as well. 13ULLARD has simply recognized the problem and proposed the best solution. Under his bill, public hos- pitals, clinics, health departments, and physicians would be permitted to provide contraceptives, and, family planning advice to teen-agers with- out procuring parental consent. How- ever, doctors could refuse to provide such services for medical or religious reasons. The debate on this issue is cer- tain to be heated, and several per- sons have already painted Bullard as "a man out to corrupt our young." But actually, he is out to save them - to save them from an unwanted pregnancy that could destroy their future, or, worse yet, an abortion that could have been avoided with proper contraceptive use, or good counselling. Many of the legislators who oppose this bill are undoubted- ly also opposed to abortions, especi- ally for teen-agers. Yet, teen-age abortions have skyrocketed in recent years, and nothing is being done to curb the rise. Unable to obtain ef- fective contraceptives, many teen- agers have come to rely on abortion - normally a last resort - as their primary means of contraception. Bullard's bill will not ' solve all these problems, no legislation could. But it is a big step in the right di- rection, and it is a step we can't afford not to take. By KEITH B. RICHBURG MISSING from the evening news is the parting shot of Henry Kissinger winging off to the mideast or Europe on a "secret mission" for his men- tor. Gone is the "lone ranger" style of foreign policy that Jim- my Carter campaigned so vig- orously against, in favor of an openness in our foreign affairs. Carter told Time magazine (Nov. 8, 1976) that "Mr. Kissinger is a very secretive man. He's in- clined to play a lonely role in the evolution of foreign policy. There's no consistency in it. There's no predictability about it." Carter promised to keep foreign policy consistent with the basic beliefs of the Ameri- can people and to involve the American people "as deeply as possible." AND JIMMY CARTER proved true to his word. Anxious to prove his own expertise in con- ducting the affairs of state, the Georgian opened his administra- tion with a foreign policy blitz often referred to as "a multi- ring spectacle." Barely sworn in as the nation's newest Vice- president, Walter Mondale was sent off to Western Europe and Japan. Secretary of State Cy- rus Vance then left for a fact- finding foray to the Middle East. Ellsworth Bunker was negotiat- ing for the administration in Panama, and Carter himself was preparing for a spring trip to the NATO summit in Europe. And perhaps the most colorful, and certainly the most contro- versial, character on this new foreign policy stage is United Nations Ambassador Andrew Young. IF YOUNG 'IS keeping with Carter's promise to make fore- ign policy open, then he is just as readily breaking rank with the President's promise to make foreign policy consistent and, predictable. If there is one thing Young definitely is not it is predictable. And on the matter of consistency, the Georgian minister has not hesitated to speak his mind, even when his statements are inconsistant with the State Department's "offic- ial" position. At his Senate confirmation hearings, Young said that he zania and Nigeria, Young out- wardly attacked Rhodesia's white minority Prime Minister Ian Smith as "an outlaw" who must be dealt with. Young, in another incident, declared that Cuban troops in Angola provid- ed a certain "stability and or- der," and on still another acca- sion, he commented that Rho- desia would have to negotiate if South Africa insisted upon it. Both statements brought quick clarifications from the State De- partment. On the Cuban re- mark, Secretary Vance insisted that the Cuban situation was not helpful and on the Rhodesia/ South Africa remark, Vance clarified that the situation was "not quite that simple." At any rate, and despite offic- ial "clarifications" of the Am- bassador's comments, Young seems determined to speak his mind. In his latest public state- ment, Young suggested that U.S. troops might be able to play a role as peace-keeper in Rhodesia, and that no one had any confidence in the British to prevent a Rhodesian civil war. THE ANDREW YOUNG style of foreign policy is, to say the least, unique. Not bound by the restraints of diplomacy, Young sees himself as a "point man" for Carter. He initiates fresh, new ideas, rather than merely regurgitate established official policy. He throws possibilities out to the public, before they become official policy. And what's more, Young brings to foreign affairs the one thing that Henry Kissinger admitted- ly tried to keep out - humani- ty. As a black American and a veteran of the civil rights move- ment, Young can relate to op- pressed peoples on a level that not even Daniel Moynihan could come close to. Young can em- pathize with the South African blacks' struggle against racism because of his own fight against racism in the American South. And he can sympathize with dissidents in the Soviet Union, who are not unlike black dissi- dents during the activist '60s' here in U.S. 'cities. YOUNG WAS A late convert to the civil rights movement, becoming active only after be- Ing: His gressman from Georgia since reconstruction. When fellow Georgian and former Governor Jimmy Carter announced his campaign for the presidency, Young was one of the first black leaders behind him, even though his friend, Georgia State Sen- ator Julian Bond, still had res- ervations. When Carter did make it to the White I-louse, Young was virtually assured of a position with the new admin- istration. He was offered the Ambassadorship to the United Nations. YOUNG DECIDED to accept the post only after weeks of soul-searching. Black leaders urged him not to accept the role of the administration's to- ken black. They told him that at the U.N. he would not be in a position to help American blacks. Others opposed the move, sayin Congress."' cided not to tunity. Young di civil rights U.N. post. transfer th gle to the and, notj blacks, but ruled Rhod ca. As You communism, lem in sou Despite the Ambas been "calle any of his And Jimmy lately picke what critics diplomacy.1 public cor though they LettE Muhammed To The Daily: Controversy over the movie Muhammed is nothing new. It stems from centuries of religi- ous beliefs. Islamic faith discourages mak- ing images of God and his Prop- hets, Muhammad. The Prophet has a very sacred role in Is- lam. Muslims have never ac- cepted the act of making im- ages of the Prophet. This move. is sacrilegious to Muslims. An- other problem with this movie is the distortion of facts that will inevitably occur as a re- sult of dramatization. Because I feel strongly about these issues, I plan to boycott the movie "Muhammed: The Messenger of God." I urge not only all the Muslims of the com- munity to boycott the movie, but other Americans as well. These are many different re- ligions in the United States, and all of them should be tolerated with respect. This is a very sen- timental issue for Muslims. It's very offensive to us to have this movie shown. - Shahida Ahmed =rs to The Daly - 1583 mem- Jon Taylor first tentative agreement. The second tentative agree- ment (now ratified contract) provides for a 30 cent raise from March. 20, '77 to March 20, '78 and a further 30 cent raise from March 20, '78 to March 20, '79. It also provides for a $125 retro- active payment for the period Jan. 1, '77 to March 20, '77 for a total package of $1,997 as of March- 20, '79. The first tentative agreement (rejected 1,300 to 300 by the membership) provided for a 25 cent raise from Jan. 1, '77 to July 1, '77, a further 25 cent raise from Jan. 1, '78 to Jan. 1, '79 for a total package of $1,716 as of Jan. 1, '79. Now it is surely safe to as- sume that had the first tenta- tive agreement been ratified and made contract the mem- bership of AFSCME Local - 1583 would have gained at least a 25 cent raise on Jan. 1, '79 with renegotiation of the con- tract. And using this conserva- tive figure one finds, the total pay increase as of March 20, '79 would have been $2,068, i.e. - $71 more than under the now ratified second agreement. As hard as this may be to ac- AFSCME Local ber. . prisons To The Daily: I was embarrassed to be part of the audience that questioned Erica Huggins on Saturday, March 19th at the Teach-In on Prisons. As Huggins said in re- sponse to one question: "I ex- pected more out of Ann Arbor." She was asked if she felt right about taking money from the federal, government for her school' and for the breakfast programs the Black Panther P4rtydruns. Is hunger to be considered a question of right or wrong? Is this part of a trend in which the Ann Arbor community is allowing self-in- terest and apathy pervade all issues that we are involved in? In ;;ecember, students voted to discontinue the boycott of non-union lettuce. Presently, minimal support and general disinterest have been the re- sponse to the AFSCME strike showing little concern for the people that maintain the build- ings we all use. When Ann Ar- bor decides to take a back seat t- : -.t.. 4 -t nnll nal i o Contact your reps Sen. Donald Riegle (Dem.), 1205 Dirksen Bldg., Washing- ton, D.C. 20510 Sen. Robert Griffin (Rep.), 353 Russell Bldg., Capitol Hill, Washington, D.C. 20515.