Newspaper Page Text
■X .1
The Southern Israelite
Vol. XLVI
A Weekly Newspaper for Southern 1 0
| • /• Q^ 0 f
in brie
\
Established 1925
Atlanta, Georgia, Friday, July 9, 1971
Pages
No. 26
JERUSALEM (JTA)—Sources
at the Interior Ministry indi
cated this week that Israel will
extend the visa of >Meir Lansky,
reputed American rackets Czar,
which expires this month. A
final decision is expected to be
announced at a later date. Lan
sky has been living in Israel on
a tourist visa for over a year.
He recently told the Jewish
Telegraphic Agency that wheth
er or not his visa is extended
he will not return to the U. S.
because, he con tends, he
wouldn’t get a “fair trial” there.
The presence of Lansky has
been something of an embarass-
ment to Israel. Officials at Lyd-
da Airport recently refused ad-
mitance to a number of Amer
icans suspected of underworld
connections who came to Israel
purportedly to visit Lansky.
the nearby Romema quarter
armed with stones and sticks.
TEL AVIV (JTA)—A spokes
man for the Jewish Defense Lea
gue told a press conference here
that the militant organization
which had its origins in racially
tense neighborhoods of New
York three years ago, will soon
open headquarters in Israel. Ac
cording to Neil Rothenberg, a
20-year-old New Yorker who
presented himself as the “inter
national coordinator of the JDL
youth movement,” its functions
will be entirely educational.
Rothenberg denied reports that
JDL was shifting its headquar
ters to Israel to escape harass-
lo:
i Kishinev Defendants
Draw Prison Sentences
authorities.
(JTA)—The Lega
tion of Communist China issued
a statement here declaring that
the Peoples Republic has had
"no contact whatever” with Is
rael, past or present, and in
tends to have none in the fu
ture. The statement was prompt
ed by wire service reports last
week that Israel would have
direct telephone communica
tions with Peking beginning
July, via the international com
munications satellite. The state
ment accused Israel of spread
ing rumors to that effect which
Continued on page 4
J ERU SALEM (JTA)—Rioting
in Jerusalem between religious
zealots protesting “Sabbath des
ecration’ and non-reli g i o u s
youths was angrily condemned
by the Cabinet and Mayor
Teddy Kollek. The Cabinet
unanimously denounced the
disturbances after hearing a
report from Police Minister
Shlomo Hillel, but declined to
place blame on any quarter.
Mayor Kollek warned that con
tinuation of the violence posed
a serious threat for the unifi
cation of Jerusalem.
Eight policemen and ten
others were injured, none seri-
ousl|r, in Saturday night’s males
sons. Ten were released. Others
are being held for further ques
tioning. The rioting broke out
at the Central Bus Terminal
where abou 200 Orthodox de
monstrators led by Rabbi Am-
ram Blau of the Neturei Karta
hurled rocks at busses and cars
entering the city before the close
of the Sabbath. The zealots
were confronted by youths from
Racketeers Again Soliciting
For Phony Newspaper
AN EDITORIAL
Those Texas racketeers are at it again—in the Atlanta
metropolitan area.
They are soliciting ads for the so-called Georgia Jewish
News, a periodical which appears as frequently as enough
suckers can be found to buy enough space to warrant a
killing. The first and last one was Passover, 1970.
The last issue of the Georgia Jewish News was com
posed of material stolen from legitimate periodicals, who
have to pay for the items, plus a pot pourri of articles having
no relationship to anything Jewish.
It was printed in Texas by the same group which has
been preying on good-will advertisers for several years. It
is not staffed by Jewish persons, although Jewish nan
•re fictitiously used at WHI to solicitation.
The solicitor* use the usual me of mlcrepr—ntattens end
falsehoods, but most victims do not bother to check with
the Better Business Bureau about legitimacy.
We urge persons who have money to waste on such
periodicals as the Georgia Jewish News to throw it out the
window. A hungry or needy person may accidentally pick
up the funds—much better than feeding the maw of Mafia-
type racketeers.
—ADOLPH ROSENBERG
The Southern Israelite
Editor & Publisher
NEW YORK (JTA)—All nine
Jewish defendants in Kishinev
were sentenced June 30 to labor
camp terms ranging from one
to five years, Jewish sources
here reported.
The heaviest penalty was
meted out to David Iserovich
Chernoglaz, a 31-year-old agron
omist with a wife and year-old
child who was arrested last
June 15.
Anatoly Moiseyeich Goldfeld
was sentenced to four years; the
prosecution had asked for five.
Hillel Zalmanovich Shur, who
went on a hunger strike and
was said by the prosecution to
deserve three years in prison,
received a two-year term.
Two-year terms were also
meted out to Aleksandei Gal
perin, Abraham Trakhtenberg,
Semeon Abramovich Levit, Ar
kady Voloshin and Gari Kirsh-
ner. David Rabinovich got a
one-year term.
Because the trial was held in
a Supreme Court, in this case
the Moldavian, there are no ap
peals, but clemency is possible.
Glenn Richter, national coordi
nator of the Student Struggle
for Soviet Jewry, said the sen
tences might have been less se
vere if world public had been
stronger.
The defendants were charj
propaganda and complicity
an layfraAIhg attempt "
Phifip E. Hoffman, president
of the American Jewish Com
mittee, said the organization
was “especially incensed” at the
sentences. “Political trials
against Jewish dissidents . . are
the Soviet Union’s way of con
tinuing a tradition of repression
whose roots go back to Czarist
times,” he said. “The AJConl-
mittee, established as a response
to Russian bigotry and crimin
ality, pledges itself to a con
tinued struggle to rescue the
Jews who are living under So
viet persecution today”
Dr. William A. Wexler, pres
ident of B’nai B’rith, said the
conviction of the Kishinev de-
tendants called for , “White
House condemnation” of the ’ “ar
rogant” Soviet policy of
“denying bpsic human rights.”
The convictions, he said, were
part of' the Kremlin’s “contin
uing campaign of intimidating
Soviet Jews,” and the political
immorality inherent in these
trials, arising from the . Jews’
wish to emigrate, is no internal
Soviet matter, but rather a vio
lation of internal principles and
law”
Dr. Wexler, who is also chair
man of the Conference of Presi
dents of Major American Jew
ish Organizations, asserted: “The
Soviet trials are contemptuous
of these international obliga
tions and our government needs
to speak out on this matter.”
Richard Maass, chairman of
the American Jewish Confer
ence on Soviet Jewry, de
nounced the sentences as further
inttmidattag its Jewish *ti—s
and discouraging them tram
applying for migration to Is
rael.
Urging increased world efforts
to halt the trials of Soviet Jews,
he called the trials “horrors of
individual and group repres
sion.
i Copyright 1971, JTA
Jewish Youth Rebellion: Does It Have Visibility?
By Ben Gallob
JTA Staff Reporter
If the current Jewish youth
rebellion in' the United States
against the adult Jewish estab
lishment may be dated from the
Six-Day War, then the time is
not far off when information
should begin to become availa
ble on whether the extraordi
nary renaissance among the
Jewish young is more than a
passing phenomenon, unique
only in the sense that it rep
resented a brief and spectacular
interruption in what many
consider the remorseless decline
of the viability of the Amer
ican Jewish collectivity.
Two facts seem to be beyond
dispute about the Jewish youth
rebellion. These are that it
emerged as a major element of
the worldwide Jewish response
to Israel’s great peril and tri
umphant emergence from that
peril in the summer of 1967;
and that it has been a move
ment sparked, led and foster
ed by the Jewish college stu
dent. In May, 1967, there was
no artifact on the American
Jewish cultural landscape as the
independent Jewish stud e n t
newspaper. There are now at
least 35 such publications and
new ones are gestated regular
ly. There was no educational
forum such as the “free” Jew
ish university; there are now
dozens of them. There was no
such living experiment as the
religiously centered collective;
there are now at least two with
some promise of survival—the
Havurah Shalom in suburban
Boston and the Havurah in
Manhattan. Because the youth
rebellion and the structures it
has created have been done not
only without help from the
Jewish establishment but in
vigorous oppossition to it, re
liable data on numbers and
processes are hard to come
by.
It would be highly useful to
know, for example, the mem
bership of the Jewish student
activist groups on American
and some Canadian campuses.
It would be similarly useful to
know the total number of stu
dents self-enrolled ijn self-orga
nized free universities, studying
Jewish topics of which their
elders are generally totally ig
norant. Consider one statistical
item that has emerged. The
Jewish Student Press Service,
formed by activist student
journalists as a central service
agency for the burgeoning
campus independent Jewish
press, suggests that the media
have from 300,000 to 400,000
readers.
Even with the concession
that the commitment of many
of the Jewish collegians may
not extend beyond such reading
habits, the implications of that
figure are striking—particularly
if viewed in contrast to the un
remitting flow of reports about
the growing rate of mixed mar
riages, a declining American
Jewish birthrate, a spreading
specter of assimilation and
other portents of despair for
the future of organized Jewish
life in America. Are there, in
fact, at least 300,000 young
American Jews so committed to
Jewish survival in their own
lives that, though roundly con
demning every aspect of the
Jewish establishment, their res
ponse is not to turn their backs
on their people but to seek to
create what they consider a
truer image of an ancient tra
dition they passionately embrace
as theirs?
Part of the answer—at this
stage—is that their commitment
has led them to take actions
which, first, set the teeth of
their elders on edge, and sec
ond, led those same elders to
admit the rebels have a case
that cannot be dismissed. The
young have challenged the
fundamental structure of the
Jewish establishment and all of
its priorities. They have spot
lighted the absurdities and vul
garities which their elders
routinely commit in the struc
tures of the institutions of the
Jewish community; its houses
of worship, its schools, its social
welfare agencies—nothing has
been sacred to the young in
surgents. And with similar pas
sion they have challenged their
elders on the priorities of the
general American society and
particularly on the disaster of
the Vietnam war.
Nevertheless, all of this has
taken place from within a pro
tected and artificial sanctuary—
artificial in that it is a tempor
ary stage in their lives and in
the sense that the young rebels
have yet to face the challenges
and demands of establishing ca
reers and families. The ques
tion which may be fateful for
the prognosis of the Jewish
future in America—is whether
the current but unique phen
omenon of student commitment
and activism for Jewish iden
tification is no more than a col
lege fad, made possible by free
dom from the grinding demands
of adult life and the willing
ness of both parents to finance
both the work and play aspects
of attending college.
Demonstrations for Soviet
Jews and for changes in Jewish
establishment priorities have
been dominated by the young.
But will they, in due time, *
when they become adults, hus
bands, wives, breadwinners and
parents, follow in the footsteps
of most of their parents and
become the no-shows at tomor
row’s protest rallies and de
monstrations and confronta
tions? When the time comes to
join a synagogue will they ac
cept the standards and norms
as adults which they now de
nounce as collegians? Having
assailed Jewish child education
as an abomination, will they,
nevertheless enroll their chil
dren in the same kind of con
gregational schools, yielding to
the same pressures for the
“learning” process leading to the
same kind of bar mitzva orgy
they now blast as obscene?
Answers should soon be avail
able. The first graduating claas
of the Jewish college genera
tion that started in the Septem
ber of the year of the Six-Day
War will be that of this month.
It will, of course, be a while
before the June, 1971 graduate*
will begin to move toward adult
commitments, but within a very
few years some patterns should
begin to emerge, some clues to
the carry-over of Jewish dedi
cation from campus to home and
jobs. In all seriousness, it may
be suggested to the graduates
who plan to continue their
Jewish studies after getting
their bachelor degrees, that a
study of the phenomenon of the
durability of the new Jewish
mood on campus may be a
major contribution to the under
standing of tomorrow’s Jewish
society.
Special JTA Analysis