Newspaper Page Text
Fag* h«r
Friday, Dec. 13, 1968
THE SOUTHERN ISRAELITE
Published weekly by Southern Newspaper Enterprises, 390 Court-
land St., N. E., Atlanta, Georgia 30193, TR 6-8249, TR. 6-8240. Sec
ond class postage paid at Atlanta, Georgia. Yearly subscription S7.50
The Southern Israelite invites literary contributions and correspond
enoe but Is not to be considered as sharing the views expressed by
writers. DEADLINE is 5 P.M. FRIDAY, but material received earlier
will have a much better chance of publication.
Ac^lph Rosenberg, Editor and Publisher
Kathleen Nease, Vida Goldgar, Edward M. Kahn
Kathy Wood, Paul Warwick, Harry Rose
Betty Meyer. Gertrude Burnham
MEMBER
GEORGIA PRESS ASSN. — 7 ARTS FEATURES
JEWISH TELEGRAPHIC AGENCY
WORLD UNION PRESS
Hanuka Omens for Atlanta
It works out, through coincidence we believe more than
any great plan, that two organizations in Atlanta have ap
proached the Hanuka season with special reasons for rejoicing.
The success stories, so to speak, of the Jewish Federation
and the Atlanta Development Israel Bonds Committee both
have summaries of their 1968 achievements depicted in this
issue pictorially.
Leaders of both groups, indeed of the entire community
of Atlanta, can be justly proud of the record their fund
raising efforts have achieved.
The Atlanta Federation, whose chief beneficiary is the
United Jewish Appeal, last week held a victory celebration,
marking the raising of the second largest figure in its history
of campaigning. The highest of course was during 1967 when
there was such a spontaneous and magnanimous response to
the Six-Day War and the sequela.
Those emergencies likewise brought a terrific response
in sale of Development Bonds for Israel’s exceptionally chal
lenged economy- The 1968 figure has been as well a fantastic
indication of the responsibility of Israel Bond purchasers.
The rejoicing in both camps, which are not opposing
movements but distinctly in the arena of cooperative efforts,
has not of course been in the nature of jubilation, but rather
in the depth of fulfillment and acknowledged responsibility.
Both kinds of participation have been outstanding examples
of sharing in the regrettably on-going emergencies which
continue to plague the Jewish State.
Yet, these indications are signs of mature awareness of
the plight of our co-religionists who undergo such pressures
in the Middle East.
Truly, the Israelis are the modern Maccabeans and the
nobility and courage they are demonstrating in meeting the
encircling dangers are in the best of the tradition which his
torically gave rise to the observance of Hanuka.
Would that this did not have to be the case, that this
beset nation could be at peace. But the conditions are very
much to the contrary and we add congratulations and apprecia
tion for the demonstrated achievements of both leaders,
workers and all participants in both the Federation and the
Bond movements.
With only slight variations this story has been reenacted
wherever there is an organized community in the South.
Conflict In New York
(GUEST EDITORIAL)
Almost everywhere you turn today in New York City
there is a conflict. Not that New York is much different from
any large urban center but everything exists to a greater
degree in the nation’s largest city. It is being assaulted by
statistics of doom of crime and struggle, black versus white,
of unions fighting the battle of inflation only to somehow
contribute to it. The teachers’ strike, community control and
campus conflicts and recently the high school pupils (mostly
black) roaming the streets and subways in protest against
make-up time, but in actuality continuing the fight against
the United Federation of Teachers, makes this all to appear
as if it were happening in some foreign and unstable country
during a coup d’etat.
It is not Mayor Lindsay’s fault although many New
Yorkers consider him responsible for the surfacing of the
problems. But, at least, now the problems are visible, even if
the solutions are not- And that, despite the discomfort, is a
giant step forward.
Odessa Synagogue
Burns To Ground
WASHINGTON (JTA) — The
Great Synagogue in Odessa, Rus
sia, wa* burned to the ground
on Nov. 26. The Soviet Govern
ment’s Novosti news agency at
tributes the fire to a “6hort cir
cuit in electrical wiring in matzoh
baking" facilities.
First word of the destruction
of the last functioning syna
gogue in the Black Sea port was
obtained here when Soviet Em
bassy officials disclosed receipt
of a cable asserting that a “pre
liminary investigation” revealed
that the conflagration was acci
dental.
Odessa has one of Russia’s
largest Jewish communities. The
Novosti report said that “the
Jewish religious community is
taking measures for restoring the
building of the synagogue and
ensuring normal conditions for
performance of religious rites by
believers.”
JEWISH CALENDAR
•HANUKA
Dec. 16-23, Mon. - Mon.
•TU BISHEVAT
Feb. 3, Monday
•FAST OF ESTHER
March 3, Monday
•PURIM
March 4, Tuesday
^PASSOVER
April 3, Thursday
(First Day)
April 10, Thursday
(Eighth Day)
•LAG B’OMER
May 6, Tuesday
•SHAVUOT
May 23, Friday
•HOLIDAY BEGINS
SUNDOWN PREVIOUS DAY
THE SOUTHERN ISRAELITE
BETWEEN YOU AND ME R y R0RIS SMOLAR
Visit To Soviet Union
Copyright 1968, JTA
This is the first of a series of columns by
Boris Smolar, editor-in-chief Emeritus of the
Jewish Telegraphic Agency, following his re
turn from a three-week visit to the Soviet
Union where he studied various aspects of
Jewish life there. He talked to numerous Jews
of all ages, discussed problems of Soviet Jewry
with high Soviet officials, and was permitted
to visit Soviet institutions to which entrance
is restricted even for Soviet citizens, including
the State Library in Leningrad — the third
largest in the world — where the Soviet Gov
ernment trains young men in Hebrew for state
purposes. The library is closed to the public,
but scientists are admitted there by special
permission for research work. Mr. Smolar also
visited the Leningrad Synagogue, the largest
and most beautiful Jewish house of worship
built in Czarist times by the St. Petersburg
Jewish community, and witnessed the demon
stration by about 12,000 Jewish youths in front
of the Moscow synagogue on Simchas Torah
evening.
MISSION TO USSR
I admit that I left New York for my trip to the
Soviet Union with a heavy heart. I had been
warned by friends not to make the trip at a time
when American-Soviet relations were not at their
best. Those who advised me against visiting the
Soviet Union advanced several reasons. First, they
thought it would not be wise for me to proceed to
Moscow alone — nor in a group. On their mind
was the disappearance and death of Charles Jordan,
executive vice-chairman of the Joint Distribution
Committee, during his visit to Prague.
Then they argued it would be dangerous for
me to visit the Soviet Union with my American
passport showing that I often visit Israel which is
now constantly being blasted in the Soviet press
and radio — and also by Soviet delegates to the
United Nations — as an “enemy” state. They also
pointed out that my name was well-known to
the Moscow authorities as a journalist who for
years has been criticizing the Soviet Government
for its discrimination against Jews in the Soviet
Union as well as for its stand against Israel.
All of these arguments made sense. However,
the fact that I was granted the Soviet visa within
three days of my application tempted me to take a
chance. I knew I would be watched in the Soviet
Union — and it turned out later that I was right in
this assumption — but I did not intend to do
anything in Russia that could be construed as
illegal and I have also been used to taking risks
during my 50 years of journalistic work. I risked
my life in Palestine, when I flew there during the
Arab riots against Jews in the “Mevraot” years,
when the British Administration there imposed
curfews in Jerusalem and other cities. I risked my
life to work in Nazi Germany for quite a time as
the only Jewish journalist, irritating the Nazi to a
point where they finally ordered me and my wife
deported “as persons whose presence in the Reich
is harmful to the State.” And I have risked working
in the Soviet Union as an American correspondent
in the years before the United States granted
diplomatic recognition to Moscow; when there was
no American Embassy in the Soviet Union to
protect me as an American citizen.
So I decided to take a risk again now.
DELICATE DISCUSSIONS
The risk turned out to be worthwhile. I think
it is correct to state that during the three weeks
of my stay in the Soviet Union — visiting Lenin
grad, Moscow and Kiev — I met with more Jews
there than any of the various Jewish delegations
from the United States who had visited the country.
I talked to at least 200 Jews. They were of various
professions and of various ages. There were among
them university students, writers, holders of
government positions, office workers, factory
workers, cultural workers — men and women.
Also religious Jews and even Jews who insisted
on conversing with me in Hebrew.
I succeeded in discussing the Soviet stand on
Israel with high officials — and Israel is an “ugly
word” today in the Soviet Union, which people
seek to avoid even in private conversations — and
was given revealing information. I naturally dis
cussed with Soviet spokesmen the question of anti-
Semitism in the Soviet Union, discrimination
against Jewish youth in universities, suppression
of Jewish culture, inequality in the treatment of
the Jewish religion, reunion of Jewish families
through emigration and other delicate subjects on
which I found the Soviet regime to be very sensi
tive. I even had a chance to spend several hours
with Arab students who are being trained in
Moscow for military purposes and was invited by
Ithem to visit their dormitory. They spoke perfect
|||ussian and very good English.
* I was invited to private Jewish homes for dinner
and I also had drinks with Soviet writers, some of
whom presented me with their books inscribed
“in friendship.” I was. among the 12,000 Jews,
mostly young students — boys and girls — who
crowded the Moscow synagogue — and the entire
block on which the synagogue is situated — on
Simchas Torah evening, presenting an unforgettable
scene of merriment within the synagogue during
the “Hakofes” and dancing the hora outside the
synagogue until after midnight under a torrential
autumn rain which did not, however, have any
effect on their jolly mood.
What helped me very much in my mission was
my knowledge of the Russian language. Also the
fact that my name was known to some author^
and editors in Leningrad and Moscow, as well as
the fact that when speaking to Soviet authorities,
I emphasized that I came primarily to study the
status of Jews in the USSR and intended to write
about it. In speaking Russian I did not try to pose
as a Russian. I always made it a point to start the
conversation by informing the people with whom
I spoke that I was an American interested in taking
a look at the situation of Soviet Jewry from the
“inside.”
Some Jews were hesitant to talk to me when
they learned that I was a Russian-speaking Ameri
can. Others, on the other hand, were very frank in
talking to me. They welcomed the fact that they
could converse with me in Russiar^since most of
them knew no English. This was especially true
about the Jewish youngsters. They do not under
stand Yiddish either, so my talking to them in
Russian bridged the gap between us.
HEBREW IN MOSCOW
Some of the elderly Jews whom I met were
extremely cautious at the beginning of our talks.
With them, my command of Russian worked the
other way around. Obviously they did not trust
me at the beginning because of my fluent Russian,
although they were told that I was an American
Jew. To them, any Soviet intelligence agent may
pose as an American Jew who speaks Russian.
At least two such Jews — one in Moscow and
one in Kiev —■ tested me by asking me in Hebrew
whether I also spoke Hebrew. When my answer
was “yes,” they began to speak to me in Hebrew.
It was a poor Hebrew but very understandable.
After conversing with them for a time in Hebrew,
I suggested that it might be easier for them to
talk to me in Yiddish. Each of them rejected the
suggestion. “It is so seldom that we have a chance
to converse in Hebrew,” was their argument for
insisting on using Hebrew as the language of our
conversation.
Only upon my landing at the Leningrad air
port — my first stop on Soviet soil — did I insist
on speaking English. There was a reason for it.
With Soviet border officials it is always better not
to show that you understand Russian. They usually
become suspicious when they hear you speaking
Russian. The formalities are gotten over much
easier when you speak English, if you are an
American.
There were only two American passengers on
the Soviet plane which brought us from Stockholm
to Leningrad. While I spoke in English to the
uniformed Soviet officials who examined my pass
port, the other American passenger — a Brooklyn
Jew — chose to show off his knowledge of the
Russian language. The result was that I had no
difficulties whatsoever with the passport and
custom authorities, while he had a terrible time
with them. They examined in detail, every piece
of luggage he had.
I was determined to wait for him until the
examination of his luggage was over, \ibut the
Soviet men in uniform insisted that I should not
wait for him. They ordered the taxi driver who
took my valise into his cab to drive off at once.
He did so, without a murmur of protest, despite
the fact that he was expecting the other American
to be his passenger also, since both of us were
assigned to the same hotel.
I felt a little disturbed over the fate of my
Jewish compatriot. I did not know his name.
Upon reaching the hotel, I waited at the registra
tion desk for him for about an hour. He did not
appear. This gave me a restless night. However,
I saw him the next morning at the restaurant in
the hotel where he was having his breakfast. He
was miserable, and wished he had not spoken to
the passport examiners in Russian.
They wanted to know from where he knew
Russian, and were especially interested to know
whether he had any relatives in Russia. When he
answered that he had, and that the entire purpose
of his trip was to visit his relatives, they insisted
on getting from him the names and addresses of
the relatives, and asked him quite a lot of ques
tions. They were even more rude to him when
they noticed that his passport carried visas showing
that he had been in Israel — something which they
made no fuss about when they saw Israeli entrance
and exit visas in my passport, apparently because
my passport indicated that I was a professional
journalist.