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The Southern Israelite
A Weekly Newspaper for Southern Jewry - Established 1925
Vol. XLVII Atlanta, Georgia, Friday, June 2, 1972 Two Sections-12 Paget No. 22
$52 Million l/.S. Grant
Goes to Israel
Mayor Says “Defense” Workers
Are Denied Emigration Permit
WASHINGTON (JTA)— The
US government this week form
ally transferred to Israel two
grants totaling $52 million which
will be used to help the reset
tlement of Jewish immigrants,
including those arriving from
NFJMC President
Urjres Involvement
MIAMI BEACH (JTA) — The
“disorganization of Judaism on
the diaspora scene” was envis
ioned by Max M. Goldberg of
Washington, D.C., president of
the (Conservative) National
Federation of Jewish Men’s
Clubs, unless there is “a greater
religious involvement in this
era of crisis by which we can
meet the challenge in the areas
of Jewish youth, education, and
synagogue participation”
The Jewish lay leader made
this statement in his presiden
tial report to his organization’s
43rd annual convention. Declar
ing that if these challenges are
“not grasped’ wrestled with
and bested,” the hope for the
“fulfillment of the true Jewish
prophecy” will fail. As a hope
ful sin, he pointed out that
there is evidence that “many of
our children want religious ex
perience.” He said that this is
a mission “that cannot be ig
nored, even though budgets
have skyrocketed and neighbor
hoods have changed to such an
extent that the future of con
gregations that have cost mill
ions to build are now faced with
problems of survival.”
the Soviet Union. The transfer
was formalized at a signing cer
emony by Israel’s Ambassador
Yitzhak Rabin and Dr. John A.
Hannah, administrator of the
Agency for International De
velopment (AID). The ceremony
was attended by Joseph J. Sisco,
Assistant Secretary of State for
Near Eastern Affairs, represent
ing the State Department, which
will administer the grants. The
$50 million grant was author
ized and appropriated by Con-
cress in foreign aid legislation.
The additional $2 million was
granted by President Nixon
from an AID contingency fund
intended to facilitate the move
ment of Jewish emigres from
the Soviet Union to Israel. Dr.
Hannah pointed out that both
grants would help Israel to re
settle large numbers of immi
grants, including those from
Russia, who, he said, “hopefully
will find more satisfying lives
and will contribute to the con
tinued development and growth
of Israel.” Responding, Rabin
described the grants as “a fur
ther tangible symbol of the
friendship between the US and
Israel” and “a demonstration of
the US government’s under-'
standing of Israel’s struggle for
peace with security.” The $50
million will go to Israel in the
form of purchases of US indus
trial and other commodities,
which the Israel government
will sell for Israeli pounds. The
proceeds will be applied to the
national budget
By JOSEPH POLAKOFF
JTA Washington Bureau Chief
MOSCOW (JTA)—The Mayor
of Moscow, V. F. Promyslov, told
a news conference that Jews in
Kissinger:
Nixon, Brezhnev
Discuss Jews
MOSCOW (JTA)— President
Nixon has discussed the issue
of Soviet Jewry with Leonid I.
Brezhnev, Secretary General of
the Soviet Communist Party,
Presidential advisor Henry Kis
singer told the press here. “We
did what we said we would do
in Salzburg,” Dr. Kissinger re
marked.
In Salzburg, Austria, where
the Presidential party stopped
over enroute to Moscow a week
ago, Kissinger told newsmen
that the President was fully
aware of the petitions signed by
over a million Americans urging
him to intervene on behalf of
Soviet Jews.
He said that the President
would look for an opportunity
to raise the matter with those
he was to meet in Moscow. Dr.
Kissinger told newsmen how
ever, “You have to consider the
problem of discussing in an in-
tional forum what one side re
gards as an internal issue.” He
did not elaborate.
the Moscow district who are not
engaged in sen
sitive military
work may ap
ply for and ob
tain visas to
migrate to Is-
-ael. The Mayor
made his state
ment in reply
to a question
after he had
spoken on Mos
cow’s potential
growth. It was
believed to be the first time a
Soviet official had publicly said
at a forum like a news confer
ence that the government will
not permit defense industry
employes to emigrate.
Promyslov, however, neglect
ed to say that, unlike the under
standing in the US of classified
defense personnel, the Soviet
defense industry embraces a
wide variety of occupations in
cluding chemists, physicists, en
gineers and mathematicians not
directly identified with military
projects.
Many Jews hold such occupa
tions knowledgeable source-
here said. Besides the enormous
ly complicated bureaucratic doc
umentation required from a po
tential emigre, an applicant
must obtain an acceptable ref
erence from his employer. Such
an act is looked upon as treason
and the employe loses his job.
Left without visible support, he
becomes a “parasite” subject to
penalties.
Promyslov, construction engi
neer and Moscow’s Mayor since
1963, told newsmen at the press
center set up for the summit
conference that Moscow had
“only” 250,000 Jews. Many of
those who want to leave can do
so but like any other coun
try, he said, the Soviet Union
cannot give permission to those
who work in the defense indus
try or some other secret activ
ities. In any case, he added,
anyone who wants to know
about Jews need just walk the
streets of Moscow and talk to
the Jews.
The Mayor added that he
understood that in Israel there
are 360 Jews who wish to re
turn to the Soviet Union but are
being prevented by Israeli res
trictions. According to a report
issued recently by the US Con
gress, only about 50 of the ap
proximately 13,000 Jews who
migrated from the Soviet Unio«
to Israel last year have asked
to return; of these, only 11 are
known to have successfully re
turned to the USSR. The report
jo br'-'d or> a study mad” by a
subcommittee of the House For
eign Affairs Committee com
prised of Rep. Jonathan B.
Bingham (D.N.Y., chairman,
and Rep. Seymour HaLpern
(R.N.Y.). They visited Israel and
Austria April 2-8 to investigate
the recent increase in “ref-
Continued on page 4
SPECIAL JTA INTERVIEW
The Forward: University of Life for the Jewish People
EDITOR WEBER AT WORK
By Murray Zuckoff
JTA NEWS EDITOR
NEW YORK (JTA) — Some
30 years ago the prophets of
doom predicted that by the be
ginning of the current decade
Yiddish newspapers would cease
to exist. Attrition and assimi
lation would they said, reduce
the readership of the Yiddish
press to the zero point.
Simon Weber, editor of the
oldest and largest existing Yid
dish daily in this country,
smiled as he recalled this dire
prognostication.
On May 21, a day after Sha-
vuot, the Forward celebrated its
75th anniversary and as he sees
the future, "We have enough
young people interested In Yid
dish to give me hope that this
paper will live long after I’m
gone."
During a recent interview,
Weber sat in his office on the
ninth floor of the Forward
Building on East Broadway and
scanned New York’s lower East
Side that was once the heart
throb of the Jewish metropolis
of this country and now is a
polyglot area of predominately
Jewish, Black and Hispanic
people.
In the past few months alone,
he noted, the Forward’s reader-
ship climbed from an estimated
56,000 to almost 75,000 daily...
Part of this increased circula-
tion, Weber said, was due To
the tragic demist of the Day-
Morning Journal last December.
But more important to the
growth and continued expansion
of the Forward, he said, is “the
revival of Yiddishkeit” among
young people, intellectuals, in
structors and assistant professors
in the colleges and universities
around the country.
"There is a renewed thirst for
the knowledge of Yiddish and
the contributions of the Jewish
people to history, culture, science
and the arts” Weber said. “We
in turn spur this interest by pro
viding them with certain fea
tures especially features dealing
with Yiddish philology, folklore,
literature and poetry.” In fact,
he noted, the Forward devotes
more space proportionately to
these subjects than to current
events.
The 75th anniversary will
symbolize not only the longevity
and decades of intense and de
voted service to the American
Jewish community but will also
be a testimony to the tenacity
of Yiddishkeit in spite of all the
forces of assimilation mobilized
by the dominant culture and by
segments of American Jewry
to acculturate the Jewish peo
ple.
MOBILIZING OPINION
Since 1897 the Forward has
been the university life for the
Jewish people in this country.
It has been a powerhouse in the
Jewish community as an organ
izer of the Jewish workers, a
consistent champion of trade
union democracy, font of lit
erary talent, an innovator in the
field of creative journalism and
investigative reporting, a stan
dard bearer of Social Democracy,
an uncompromising opponent of
Stalinism and left-wing and
right-wing anti-Semitism and a
campaigner for the rights of
Jewish people everywhere. “The
enduring quality of the For
ward,” Weber said, “is its ca
pacity to mobilize opinion.”
Just as the East Side has
changed over the years, so too
has the readership of the For
ward. Despite this, Weber noted
that its older readers maintain
an abiding loyalty. “I get let
ters from people who began to
read the Forward 50 to 60 years
ago and are still reading it.”
But, he noted, “Whereas many
years ago readers of the For
ward were mostly shopworkers
and the paper and its readers
were labor oriented, most of our
readers now are mainly retired
people, intellectuals, small busi
ness people and professionals.”
His eyes sparkled as he noted
that many of his readers are
Talmudic scholars. “Let anyone,
God forbid, make a mistake in
a quotation from the Talmud
and there will be a flow of
letters correcting it."
The Forward editorial staff
represented, and still does, the
man to whom nothing human
was alien. Some of the most
quintessence of the Renaissance
famous writers, critics, essayists
and folklorists are featured in
the Forward. Isaac Bashevis
Singer, Baruch Shefner Boris
Smolar, Dr. Judah J. Shapiro,
Mordechai Strigler, Chaim
Grade, Wolf Younin and S L.
Shneiderman grace the pages of
thP Forward. The latter three
came to the Forward from the
Day-Morning Journal after its
demise. Smolar is the Editor
Emeritus of the Jewish Tele
graphic Agency and Dr. Shapiro
writes a weekly column in Eng
lish in the paper’s Sunday mag
azine section.
But the Forward in • the past
also had ideologues, scholars,
poets, playwrights and fiction
writers such as Morris Rosen-
feld, Abraham Reisen, Sholem
Asch, I. J. Singer and Yona
Rosenfeld. Scintillating and pas
sionate editorials, sententious
Continued on page 4