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PAGE 4 THE SOUTHERN ISRAELITE February 5, 1982
The Southern Israelite
The Weekly Newspaper lor Southern lewry
laibliihed 192S
Vida Goldgar
Fjdstor and Publisher
Bambi Jo Eaton
Assistant Editor
Leonard Goldstein
Advertising Director
Luna Levy
Copy Editor
Eschol A Harrell
Production Manager
Published every Friday by Ili€ Southern Israelite, Inc.
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Mailing Address P.O. Bo* 77388, Atlanta, Georgia 30357
location: 188 15th St , N.W Phone (404) 876 8248
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The
Southern Israelite
A Prize-Winning
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1980
1981
Better Newspaper
Contests
Guest editorial
Promises, promises
The Israelis who settled in the Sinai after the 1967 Six Day
War thought they had a promise from their government to help
them stay in the Sinai. They were wrong.
Part of Egypt’s price for the C’amp David peace agreement was
the removal of all Jews from the Sinai, and the government of
Israel agreed to this condition.
Six Israelis came to Washington last week as representatives of a
movement opposing withdrawal from the Sinai. They say they
have a million signatures of Israelis supporting their position.
They oppose withdrawal, they say. because they do not trust
the government of Egypt to keep its word once the Sinai has been
given up. They also do not trust the government of the United
States to keep its word. And they are fearful of what will happen if
the government of Israel persists in keeping its promise to Egypt
and the IJ.S. to withdraw.
This boils down to a question of whose promise is good. To
have faith in the Sinai withdrawal, Israelis must place more trust
in the promises of Egypt and the U.S. than they can in the
promises of their own government, which they do not fully trust in
the first place. One would not have to be a person of little faith to
he skeptical.
Visit to Israel
by T imothy S. Mescon
Today I cried
1 stood in Jerusalem at Yad
Vashem, the memorial to the
martyrs and heroes of the
Holocaust, and wept openly.
Never before and hopefully never
again will 1 witness the atrocities,
the vengeance, and the inhumanity
directed by one man against
another.
For the past two weeks, I have
had the opportunity to traverse a
truly remarkable country. A
country not much bigger than the
state of Connecticut with not much
more than three million people,
but a country with a spirit and a
will to survive like 1 have never
before experienced.
My visit to Israel provided an
inside-out perspective of the land,
of her people, of a nation. I slept at
a kibbutz I dined with Ali Biram
and his family in Daliat El-Carmel,
a Druze village. I visited a
community center in Tamra, an
Arab village, and met with the
interns for peace. I visited with
Hanan Bar-on, deputy director-
general of the Israel Ministry of
Foreign Affairs.
I sat in the Knesset (Parliament)
and discussed current and future
problems with Yosef Rom, a
memberof Prime Minister Begin’s
Likud Party, and Daniel Rosolio,
Labor party representative. I
viewed the ancient cities of Jaffa,
Caesarea and Masada. I stood at
the Churches of Nativity and the
Holy Sepulcher, the Dome of the
Rock, and at the Western Wall. 1
waded in the Dead Sea, the Sea of
Galilee, and the Mediterranean. I
saw snow on Mt. Hermon and not
two hours later sat in the Judaean
desert.
Most importantly, however, I
came to realize the “meaning of
territory.”
In one day I visited Kiryat
Shimona, a development town
situated on the Lebanese border,
established by North African
immigrants after Israeli
independence in 1949. Last July
this community was bombarded
by Russian Ketusha rockets. From
Kiryat Shimona I visited the Good
Fence at Metulla, on the
Lebanese border. Here citizens of
Lebanon enter into Israel each day
to work and return the same
evening. Because the safety of
Israelis entering Lebanon cannot
be guaranteed, traffic through the
border is still one-way.
1 then went to Tel Faher and sat
in a former Syrian bunker on the
Golan Heights taken during the
Six-Day War by the Golani
brigade commanded by Moshe
Dayan. And then, to conclude the
day, I traveled along the Jordan
valley through the oasis of Jericho,
on to Jerusalem. In one day, 1
visited Israeli outposts and towns
on the borders of Lebanon, Syria
and Jordan. In one day, I came to
understand the “meaning of
territory."
That night, I slept at Kibbutz
Hagoshrim situated almost at a
junction of Lebanon and Syria. As
I walked the kibbutz, 1 talked with
parents and children about life in a
border settlement. I saw, next to
the school, a bomb shelter. I saw,
next to the dining room, a bomb
shelter. I saw, next to the factory, a
bomb shelter. I saw, next to the
synagogue, a bomb shelter. During
the stHhmer.of 1981, this kibbutz,
like the city of Kiryat Shimona,
was struck by Russian Ketusha
rockets In 10 days, five rockets
landed on the kibbutz. In one
night, 1 came to understand the
“meaning of territory.”
The chorus of voices from
around the world has joined in a
unilateral condemnation of the
Begin government. Prime
Minister Begin has been accused of
typifying our American
perspective of a belligerent hawk,
opposed to peace, intent on
expanding Israeli territory. Prime
Minister Begin signed the Camp
David agreement pledging the
return of the Sinai to Egypt.
The recent extensions of Israeli
law to the Golan Heights is merely
an attempt to continue the process
of peace and security. The threat of
bombardment of Ketushas from
neighboring borders is a threat we
as Americans simply cannot
imagine. The threat of territorial
encroachment in the United States
is nonexistent.
The survival of the nation of
Israel—a nation like the United
States founded on the ideals of
religious and economic freedom-
must be ensured. Since 1948, the
year of Israeli independence, the
nation has not seen a decade
without war, a decade with peace.
We as citizens of the greatest
country in the world must be
willing to guarantee peace and
prosperity to the only democracy
in the Middle East, to Israel, a
country with a knowledge of
territory. f>
Dr. Timothy S Mescon is an
assist ant professor of management.
College of Business Administration
at Arizona State University. He is
the son of Mike and Enid Mescon
of Atlanta. The above material is
reprinted from the Phoenix (Ariz.)
Gazette. — Editor.
Islam: What does it mean?
by Stanley M. Lefco
“To be an Arab, one must be a
Muslim," said Libya’s Colonel
MuammarQaddafi. It isthe Takfir
wa Hijra sect of fanatical Muslims
who are accused of killing Anwar
Sadat and seek a return to a purely
Islamic society. The word “Islam"
appears almost daily in the news,
but do we know what it means?
One cannot in a few short
paragraphs describe Islam other
than touch upon some of its high
points.
Its teachings closely resemble
Judaism. Founded in the seventh
century, it is considered by some
an off-shoot of Judaism. Its
cardinal doctrine is monotheism;
idolatry is viewed as the greatest of
sins. The doctrine of original sin is
not accepted, and Adam's fall is
not a sir. but a falling away.
Allah determines the destinies of
men. He is a teacher and a guide
and if one disbelieves him, he will
lead one further astray. He
sustains man, is merciful, and
speaks to man through the Kur’an.
which is basically the Islamic
Bible. According to it, Arabs arc
descendants of Ishmael.
Abraham's older son.
The Hadith is second to the
Kur’an and is a body of
transmitted actions and sayings of
the prophet, Muhammad, and his
companions. It can be equated in
value as the New Testament to
Christians. There are, however,
many Hadiths, and not all are
acceptable to all groups.
Adam is considered the first
prophet. Abraham is viewed as
belonging neither to Judaism or
Christianity, but is simply a man
who submitted himself to God.
Moses is a frequently mentioned
prophet in Islam. Jesus is rejected
as the son of God. Islam does not
accept his death as an atonement
for man's sins or that he was
resurrected.
The Jews are considered the
people of the book since God gave
them the scriptures, but Islam sees
the Jews as having perverted the
revelations of God. Islamic law
relegates Jews to second class
citizenship.
Muhammad (570-632), the
prophet through whom God made
his final revelation, began his
preachings on Mount Hira. He
was orphaned at an early age and
married a widow, 15 years his
senior, who bore him several
children. When his first wife died,
he remarried and had several
wives.
It was not Muhammad’s
intention to found a new religion.
He and his successors followed
Jewish models on prayer, dietary
law and circumcision. In the
beginning, he addressed his
preachings to the citizens of
Mecca. In his mid-life, he began
having visionary experiences
which convinced him that he was
the chosen agent of divine
revelation. He claimed that he was
the last of the prophetic line. Later
he sought acceptance by the Jews,
but they rejected him as an
imposter He turned against them
and a military struggle ensued in
which many Jews were killed or
banished.
Continued next page.
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