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ATLANTA JEWISH FEDERATION
$630,000—1982 CAMPAIGN GOAL
HELP THE COMMUNITY MEET ITS GOAL
Mixed signals
from Washington
by Joseph Polakoff
TSI’s Washington correspondent
WASHINGTON—The State
Department has rejected Israeli
views that the assassination in
Paris of an Israeli diplomat is a
violation by the Palestine
Liberation Organization of the
cessation of hostilities along the
Lebanese border and that PLO
installations should be closed as a
result of the killing.
Tlwt—napaim matimmm toward
Israel follow the U.S. veto of a
resolution sponsored by Jordan in
the United Nations Security
Council that would have
denounced Israeli measures on the
West Bank and demanded Israel
return to office three Palestinian
Arab mayors ousted by Israeli
authorities for refusing to meet
with them on area matters.
Zaire abstained on the anti-
Israeli resolution, which the
council supported 13-1.
Charles Lichenstein, U.S.
deputy representative to the
United Nations, observed that the
resolution “uses denunciatory
language that does not take
account of the complexity of the
West Bank problem.”
Following the assassination
outside his home by a gunwoman
of Yacob Barsimanto, second
secretary in the Israeli F.mbassy in
Paris, the Israeli government
called on all European nations to
close PLO offices in their capitals.
Foreign Minister Yitzhak Shamir
charged many PLO offices “serve
as bases” for “an incessant chain of
murders and terrorist actions”
against Israelis.
In Washington, a source at the
Israeli Embassy told The Southern
Israelite that it had not filed a
specific request with the State •
Department to close the PLO
offices in New York and
Washington, noting that the call in
Jerusalem for closing was a
"general” request. The Washington
chapter of the American Jewish
Congress issued a statement
calling for the closing of PLO
operations in the U.S.
The PLO headquarters in Beirut
reportedly denied responsibility for
the assassination. Press reports
said a body called the “Lebanese
Armed Revolutionary Brigade”
took responsibility.
Responding to questions from
The Southern Israelite, the State
Department said it would not take
action against the PLO offices in
the U.S. “Both offices are
registered with the Justice
Department in accord wfflr the
Foreign Aftnu II %haHt»a. iUr
as amended," a department
spokesman said. “As long as the
offices regularly file reports on
their activities as agents of a
foreign organization with the
Justice Department, comply with
all other relevant laws, and are
staffed by persons who are legally
resident aliens, they are entitled to
operate under the protection the
First Amendment provides."
At the Justice Department, The
Southern Israelite was informed
that four “primary registrants” of
Palestinians in the U.S. are the
Palestine Liberation Organization
at the U.N., the Palestine Labor
Organization in New York, the
Palestine Arab Delegation to the
U.N. and “Marilyn Perry,” the
representative of the permanent
observer of the PLO at the United
Nations.
A Justice Department
spokesman said that the PLO files
reports twice a year and that
authority to close down the offices
is vested with the State
Department.
Israeli cabinet ministers
consider that the assassination
violated the July 24 cessation of
hostilities on the Lebanese border,
noting that “any terrorist act
committed by a Lebanon-based
group—inside Israel or elsewhere—
is a violation. The State
Department, however, said that
“while we condemn in the
strongest terms the cowardly
terrorist act of murder of the
Israeli diplomat in Paris, we don't
have any information on the group
claiming responsibility for the
killing."
The Southern
Israelite
The Weekly Newspaper For Southern Jewry
Our 57th Year
Vol. LVII1
Atlanta, Georgia, Friday, April 9, 1982
No. 15
i r
Ti -CJ JU
H ‘H -o
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Message
Israel reassures U.S. on Sinai
by David Friedman
WASHINGTON (JTA) —
Rabbi Shlomo Goren, Israel’s
chief Ashkenazic rabbi, said last
week he brought President Reagan
a message from Prime Minister
Menachem Begin affirming that
Israel will withdraw from the Sinai
as scheduled on April 25.
“We are going to fulfill the peace
treaty with Egypt till the last word
according to its spirit and to the
letter,” Gorgn told a press
conference at the Israeli Embassy.
“We hope that Egypt will also
fulfill its commitment toward
Israel.”
Goren said that during his 20-
minute meeting with Reagan at the
White House, he also stressed that
there was a “national consensus”
"against the establishment of a
Palestinian stale and that
“Jerusalem will remain united”
and the capital of Israel. “Zionism
without Zion, this is ridiculous,”
Goren asserted.
The chief rabbi said he was sent
to Washington to provide Reagan
with a sense of the “moral and
spiritual” feeling in Israel. He later
told the Jewish Telegraphic
Agency thpt it is believed in Israel
that Americans are more receptive
to views from religious leaders. He
noted that while Israeli diplomats
continue to do their work, it is
sometimes valuable to hear the
Gorttt "said that one of the
ranso— hi that Israel is “still the
Only democratic state in the
Middle East. I am afraid that Israel
is a super democracy, too much
democracy,” the rabbi added.
Goren stressed the “trauma” it is
going through because of its
withdrawal from Sinai. He
specifically noted that Israel has to
destroy homes and force settlers to
leave an area that they built up
with their “blood" and with their “love."
He noted that before he left
Israel, 15 Sinai settlers asked him
to seek support from Reagan for
them to remain in the area after the
Egyptians take over. But he said he
had not brought this up because
Israel was committed to the
withdrawal of all the settlements
under the peace treaty. However,
Goren noted the Sinai has always
been Egyptian territory since 1904,
and that the first settlers in the
Sinai were the ancient Israelites,
who wandered there for 40 years
and received their Torah at Mount
Sinai.
Goren stressed that Israel was
committed to the autonomy talks,
but this did not mean a Palestinian
state. He said he told Reagan that a
Palestinian state would be
“another Cuba” in the Middle East
and a threat to the West as well as
Israel A Palestinian state would
mean that every city and
settlement in Israel would be under
the threat of shelling from the
Palestine Liberation Organization,
Goren stressed.
Goren said that Israel would not
allow the Holy land to be divided
again, as it was in 1922 when
Jordan was created. He said the
autonomy being offered the
Palestinians by Israel would give
them the “right of running their
own lives” and at the same time
remaining citizens of Jordan He
said the residents of the West Bank
and Gaza Strip would also have
the right of becoming citizens of
Israel and having full rights
See Message, page 21.
Israeli soldiers patrol the streets of Yamit, as truckloads of household goods and farm equipment head
north. Most of the settlers departed before the March 31 midnight deadline in readiness for Israel's April
25 withdrawal from Sinai. However, a hard core of several hundred persons defied the deadline—some
have promised bloodshed should Israeli soldiers try to evict them.