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PAGE 4 THE SOUTHERN ISRAELITE July 18, 1986
The Southern Israelite
The Weekly Newspaper For Southern J*\yrv
'Since 1925
Vida Goldgar
Editor and Publisher
Leonard Goldstein
Advertising Director
Luna Levy
Associate Editor
Eschol A. Harrell
Production Manager
Lutz Baum
Business Manager
Published every Friday by The Southern Israelite, Inc.
Second Class Postage paid at Atlanta, Ga (ISSN 00388) (UPS 776060)
POSTMASTER: Send address changes to The Southern Israelite, P O Box
77388, Atlanta, GA 30357
Mailing Address: P.O. Box 77388, Atlanta, Georgia 30357
Location: 188 15th St., N.W., Atl„ Ga. 30318 Phone (404)876-8248
Advertising rates available upon request.
Subscriptions: $23.00, 1 year; $41.00, 2 years
Member of Jewish Telegraphic Agency; Religious News Service;
American Jewish Press Assn.; Georgia Press Assn.; National Newspaper Assn.
Judicial jumble
Hat’s off to Academy
Many times we have used this space to call attention to the
high quality of Jewish education our community provides.
We are proud to be able to do so once again, this time to focus
on the national recognition just accorded the Hebrew Academy ol
Atlanta.
The Academy was chosen as one of two private schools in
Georgia and one of 60 from around the nation to be honored by
the 1985-86 Elementary Private School Recognition Program.
The announcement said the Academy “exemplifies important
characteristics of excellence and is clearly deserving of inclusion
among a select group of representative private elementary schools"
and that it “is a distinctive school and one with qualities worthy of
emulation.”
That’s pretty high praise and all those connected with the
Academy can be justifiably proud to have earned such accolades.
So a tip of the TSI hat to the administration, faculty, staff,
officers, board, parents and students for their ongoing achieve
ments.
Mazal tov!
This is justice?
The Italian court has labored mightily and brought forth a
mouse.
Last week’s sentencing of the murderer of Leon Klinghoffer to
30 years in prison is a disgrace, as is the leniency of most of the
other sentences.
The court’s acceptance of the argument that this was a
“political crime” was another example of a policy of appeasing
PLO terrorists and, in effect, sends a signal to all terrorists that it’s
OK to kill innocent civilians.
We join in appealing to our government to strenuously press
for extradition to this country for trial.
by Carl Alpert
-HAIFA
The dramas enacted in Israel s
courts of law reflect not only the
usual commercial and social con
flicts, but also the numerous cul
tures, philosophies, theologies and
sets of ideals held by the popula
tion. The following are gleaned
from recent news items in the Israel
press:
The Rambam's close shave. A
resident of Petach 1 ikvah has peti
tioned Israel’s high court to stop
the use of the one-shekel note
which, he claims, depicts the Ram-
bam in an anti-halachic manner,
with a distorted beard and shaven
sidelocks.
Justice done automatically. To
emphasize the pressure under which
traffic courts operate, Judge Moshe
Hasson testified that once, in sign
ing a large batch of automatic con
victions for traffic offenses, he had
inadvertently approved conviction
of himself on the basis of a traffic
ticket. He did not reveal if he
appealed the conviction to a higher
court.
An acceptable argument. A 16-
year-old girl from Ofakim petiti
oned the local court for permission
to marry her boyfriend, though she
was under age. The case dragged
on for months, and when it finally
came to a hearing the girl was not
present. The judge ordered that she
be brought to court to present her
arguments, but was informed that
that very morning she had given
birth to a baby girl at the Soroka
Hospital. The petition was granted.
A matter of language. Shimon
Barak objected to the traffic ticket
which he received for parking in a
reserved area outside the French
Embassy in Tel Aviv. He showed
the police officer a letter from the
embassy permitting him to park
there because he had come to repair
the embassy’s elevator. The police
man could not read French, and
insisted on the ticket. The court of
first instance imposed a fine, but
on appeal a higher court reduced
the fine to the equivalent of less
than a cent.
Guilty plea rejected. Zion Adari,
19, of Lod, was charged with 33
counts of property offenses, and
requested that an additional guilty
plea be appended for a drug offense.
The prosecution objected on the
grounds that Adari was taking the
rap for his brother, in the belief
that his overall penalty would
hardly be affected. The court did
not accept the guilty plea.
Houdini in court. Yehezkel
Weizman, 26, from Dimona, was
charged by the police with damag
ing a pair of handcuffs placed on
him during his arrest. Weizman
denied the charge, claiming that he
could free himself from the police
handcuffs without damaging them
in any way. Under challenge by the
judge, he proceeded to do so, once
with his hands in front of him, and
once with his hands locked behind
his back. The charge was dismissed.
Good deeds of the fathers. Two
Arab members of the Kurdayeh
family in Jerusalem were charged
with large-scale tax evasion and
faced long prison terms and fines.
When it was revealed in court that
in 1929 their family had at great
personal risk saved the lives of 24
Jews in the face of Arab rioters, an
act for which they were later ostra
cized by their neighbors, the court
accepted an agreement between
the two counsels, whereby the ac
cused pleaded guilty as charged,
and the prosecution waived the
demand for imprisonment.
My best friends...
by Stanley M. Lefco
In its June 1986 edition, Atlanta
Magazine highlighted eight indi
viduals “who changed Atlanta.”
According to the magazine, these
people “through their achievements
and spirit, have helped usher in
Atlanta’s emerging greatness.” One
of those spotlighted was Dillard
Munford, who heads up the Majik
Market chain of some 875 stores
plus the World Bazaar and Lee
wards Craft Bazaar stores.
Born in 1918 in Cartersville, he
was described by the magazine as
exemplifying the “Old South.”
Munford also has apparently gar
nered a reputation as a rascist,
which the magazine clarifies as a
“simplistic view”: His world may
“indeed, (be) black and white but
in a sense that is not restricted to
Justice
18
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race.” His directness is noted, and
Munford is quoted as having said,
“I don’t say anything behind some
one’s back that I don’t say to his
face.”
The article is devoid of Mun-
ford’s views towards Jews and Is
rael, but as a regular columnist in
the Northside Neighbor, he has
made his position pretty clearly
known. Our first encounter with
him was a letter we wrote in re
sponse to an article he had written
a little over a year ago on President
Reagan’s visit to the Bitburg ceme
tery.
Munford had charged the Jew
ish community with overreaction.
By his analysis, the “Jewish lobby”
controls Middle East policy. He
explained the Bitburg protest as an
attempt on the part of American
Jewry to change U.S. foreign pol
icy in Europe or at least with West
Germany. He found it sad that
Jews, who have reached a “pinna
cle ot linancial success and politi
cal power,” would waste their ener
gies on this issue instead of “work
ing to stabilize and cement the
capitalistic system....”
In response to our challenge to
his explicit assertions and their dis
turbing implications, Munford ve
hemently answered that he is “not
anti-semitic (sic), have never been
anti-semitic, and don’t ever expect
to be anti-semitic.” He informed
us that he and 1 in our own ways
were both simply trying to preserve
our heritage: his identified as
“completely American” and ours a
mixture of “American, European
and Israeli.” He also advised us
that our letter was the only one he
had received on his Bitburg article
and two of his Jewish friends even
complimented him on his column
while not agreeing with it totally.
Our follow-up letter, which ad
mittedly posed a number of ques
tions, went unanswered. He did
suggest in his first letter that we
meet, but we declined in the hope
that we could further define the
issues.
On Oct. 16, 1985, Munford once
again went after the Israeli lobby
by which he surely must have meant
in large measure the Jewish com
munity. This time it was the oppo
sition to the sale of fighter planes
to Saudi Arabia. Through the lobby,
the U.S. is “led around by the nose
by its little friend (Israel).” For all
its aid to Israel, the U.S. gets
nothing in return. Israel, for ex
ample, “still refuses to trade its
acquired territories for peace.”
On June 4, 1986, Munford took
the offensive again and attacked
the Israeli lobby for its opposition
to the sale of “defensive arms” to
Saudi Arabia, “one of America’s
few friends in the Arab world.”
The reason certain congressmen
voted against the sales, he wrote,
was “to pay off their debts to the
Israeli lobby, safe in the knowledge
that the president would exercise
the veto.” American Jews and Is
raeli friends “must allow our State
Department to control Mideast
policy with Israel as our first
thought...but it shouldn’t be our
last thought also.”
We don’t know Munford'sgame,
but we seriously question his orien
tation. He could use a good course
on foreign policy, history of the
Middle East, and let’s not forget
some lessons on the Holocaust.
Maybe just a tour of the Zachor
Holocaust Resource Center.
We anxiously await the day he
does a story on lobbying as part o!
the democratic process. We’d wel
come a story on the PLO or Syria
or even Saudi Arabia, the real
Saudi Arabia that is.
We’re not holding our breath,
but we’ll be patient.