Ohio Jewish Chronicle, 1975-04-17

              ■■O ,•*.
i«m   A^riA
_.i  »  I .»
."totr.-.ji,^-^^^,^. J
hi.Jwwii»AaJI m\?1. ^
iii»tt. '^d&g^ffi|
r.
tt* ■
r
^Jl^yServIng Columbus and Central Ohio Jewish Community for Over 50 Years yU/\YJi
APRIL 17, 1975 - WAR 6
LlBFlAKY,   OHIO   HISTORICAL  SOCIETY
198E   VELM^   AVE.
cols, o.-   43211 exoh
VOL. 53 NO. 16
Abzug Committee Holds Hearing On Boycott:
iiarges Federal Agencies With Violations
Anti-Semitism In Berlin -1938
"Germans, defend yourselves, don't trade in Jewish
shops," reads a sign Nazi Storm Troopers paste on a
window of a Jewish-owned store in Berlin in 1938. This
technique was mild compared to the wrecking of
Jewish businesses and defiling of synagogues by mobs
which went unchecked by police during the late 1930s in
German cities.
This' year marks the 30th anniversary - of the
liberation of the survivors of the Holocaust from Nazi
concentration camps and scholars are pondering the
extent of Christian responsibility for that epochal
event. Several conclaves have been held on the subject
and new study of the Holocaust, The War Against the
Jews 1933-1945 by Lucy Dawidowicz, had been
published.
 RELIGIOUS NEWS SERVICE PHOTO  '
Vishniac: Jews Have Renewed
Interest In The Holocaust
by BUI Cohen
Chronicle Special Reporter
Dr. Roman Vishniac, one
of the worldls most famous
photographers who has a
collection of unique pictures
of European Jewry before
and during the reign of the
Nazis, says Jews seem to be
more interested in The
Holocaust now than ever
before.
Vishniac, now 80 years old,
made the observation while
participating in the Ohio
State University Hillel
Foundation's ' Holocaust
.Memorial Program last
week.
He showed slides that he
1 had taken of Polish Jews
before World War H and also
pictures taken by the Ger¬
mans during the War. His
lecture was titled, "The Life
That Disappeared."
Vishniac, who lost all his
relatives and friends to Nazi
concentration camps and
terror, told The Chronicle
that Jews are no longer
trying to forget about the
Holocaust but, instead, are
expressing more and more
interest.
"In 1945, 1946 and 1947,
here in America, everybody
wanted to forget," he ex¬
plained.
(CONTINUED TO PAGE 11)
WASHINGTON (JTA) -
The Anti - Defamation
League of B'nai B'rith ad¬
vised Congress April 8 that
both Congressional over¬
sight of present U.S. laws
against discrimination and
new federal legislation are
necessary to counter the
Arab boycott's abuse of the
rights of American citizens.
"Both are needed to make it
unlawful for American
businessmen to comply with
discriminatory requests"
from Arab countries and "to
permit those hurt by
discrimination to sue fpr
damages," David Brody, the
ADL's Washington director,
testified before the House-
Subcommittee on Govern¬
ment Information and In¬
dividual Rights headed by
Rep. Bella Abzug (D.NY.).
"If a little country like The
Netherlands can do it," he
added, "a great country like
ours certainly can do it."
Brody referred specifically
to the Dutch Ministry of
Justice making it a criminal
offense to comply with
discrimination against
Dutch Jews and the can¬
cellation by the Dutch
Foreign Minister of a visit to
Saudi Arabia because a
Dutch Jewish journalist was
denied entry.
The Abzug panel opened
hearings on governmental
policies and practices
relating to the assignment of
personnel both by the
agencies or their contractors
to overseas areas. State
Department and Treasury
officials testified they were
committed to a federal.
. policy of non-discrimination.
Assistant Treasury
Secretary Warren F. Brecht
said that Treasury
procurement  offices   must
include in their formal
contract documents the
appropriate equal op¬
portunity clauses to assure
contractor compliance with
executive orders.
Rep. Sam Steiger (R.
Ariz.), the ranking
Republican oh the sub¬
committee and a B'nai
B'rith member himself,
agreed with the opposition to
the Arab blacklist of
business concerns identified
with Israeli trade or Jewish
management and also ex¬
pressed opposition to
discrimination within the
United States. But he said
that seeking to "impose your
will and customs on others"
is "not the proper role for
us." He said that "a fair
-equation is trying to impose
democracy in Vietnam;"
Pointing but that his views]
might be interpreted as anti-
Semitic, Steiger pointed out
that he himself is a Jew. He
said that it would be
"counter ■■■-;,, productive" to
attempt "to force our will on
others," with regard to the
laws of that country. "It
would be ludicrous for
Vinnell to employ Jewish
combat instructors to in¬
struct the Saudis to oppose
the Israelis," he said. The
Vinnell Corporation of
California has a defense
contract to train Saudi
troops. Rep. Abzug charged
that federal agencies which
assign personnel overseas
were in clear violation of the
1965 Civil Rights Act and of
Executive Order 11478, both
of which require government
agencies to adopt a strong
affirmative action program
to assure equal opportunity.
"Acquiescence to religious
or racial discrimination by
foreign countries is a
'negative action' program,"
(CONTINUED TO PAGE 15)
AJC Charges Simon Signed Agreement
To Exclude Qualified Jews From Projects   f
The American Jewish
Congress charged Sunday
(April 13) that Secretary of
the Treasury William E.
Simon had signed what
amounted to "an agreement
to accommodate the
religious bias of the-Saudi
Arabian government and...
to exclude qualified Jews"
from projects authorized bys
the U.S.-Saudi Arabian
Commission on Economic
Cooperation.
In a letter to the Secretary,
Rabbi Arthur Hertzberg of
Englewood, N.J., president
of the Congress, cited a.
statement adopted last June
8 by the U.S. Saudi - Arabian
Commission — and signed
by Mr. Simon for the U.S. —
which requires that" in¬
structional programs to be
provided by American ex¬
perts be "sensitive to the
social, cultural, political and
religious contexts of Saudi
Arabia."
This requirement, Rabbi
Hertzberg said, represented
an "implicit understanding
that the Saudi Arabian
government will not be
obliged to deal with, accept
or recognize American
citizens whom; it .finds ,ob-
jectionable on any of these
grounds."" '■■-..
the American Jewish
Congress' leader described
the        provision as
"euphemistic concealment"
of an agreement to
acquiesce in Saudi Arabia's
discrimination against
American Jews.
Rabbi  Hertzberg  com¬
mented:
;. '"Itie rights of American
citizens are not for'sale to
the highest bidder, no matter
how many oil wells he may
have.
(CONTINUED ON PAGE VI)
Urge International Commission
Probe Human Rights Violations
BEHIND THE HEADLINES
Can It Ever Happen Again?
By-Jack Siegel
NEW YORK (JTA) - The
recent statement by Ashraf
Ghorbal, the Egyptian
Ambassador to the United
' States, in a right-wing
weekly in Argentina that the
Arabs have decided "to put
an end to Judaism ... which
must disappear. Today,
tomorrow, it will disap¬
pear," placed alongside the
memorialization of the 30th
year of the liberation of Nazi
extermination camps puts
,into bas relief the whole
question again of anti-
Semitism.
Ghorbal's call for the
destruction of a religion is
new; it is not Zionism, it is.
not Israel he wants
destroyed, but in effect the
whole Jewish people. Hitler
had the same idea in his final
solution and while he did not
succeed, he did dispose of six
million Jews, among other
nationals.
Thirty years ago, this
writer was a Private in the
Military Intelligence Service
of the Army of the United
States. And until the time he
was shipped home in
December 1945, he was
assigned to two American
internment camps for Nazi
political prisoners. In that
time, he "interviewed" an
average of six a day, six
days a week for a little more
than 40 weeks. He had a
glaring opportunity to look
into the heart of German
' Nazism generally, and with
respect to the Jewish
question.
! a parade of "human
' beings" crossed his path,
men and women who had
worked for Hitler ahd had
advanced his plans and,
while many lied about their
redemption,' others claimed
they were "belogen and
betrogen" (lied to and
betrayed) by the Bonzen
(officials). Others claimed
"Ich bin kein Nazi" (I am
not a Nazi).
In the light of this an¬
niversary, it is perhaps well
to recall that moment of
history when Hitler's empire
came crumbling down under
the onslaught of allied forces
and the rottenness of his
society was exposed in its
corrupted human beings.
They were many and varied;
government officials,
businessmen, professors and
workers, both men and
women. At this writing, one
in particular comes to mind
because of the oddity of his
'situation and its ' con¬
tradiction.
He was a "Gauredner"
(State Speaker) and his job
was to tour his area, make
Nazi speeches and exhort the
people to support Hitler. He
had this title and .function
from 1933 to 1935 and he was
(CONTINUED TO PAGE ID"
NEW YORK (WNS) — An
appeal signed by 100 Soviet
Jews urging the creation of a
special international
commission to investigate
"the violations of human
rights in the USSR in con¬
nection with . Jewish
emigration to Israel," has
been received by the Greater1
New York Conference on
i Soviet Jewry. The appeal
said the commission was
needed to "investigate legal
and moral aspects' of these
violations, to make them
public, to publicize the
struggle for free Jewish
emigration from ]the USSR."
The appeal was addressed to
"the Jewish communities of
the world, to international
public organizations and to
all people of good will."
Meanwhile the mothers of
Boris Tsitlionok and Mark
Nashpitz and the son of Dr.
Mikhail Stern ended their
three-day hunger strike at
the Isaiah Wall across from
the United Nations. Batya
Tsitlionok and Itta Nashpitz
protested the five-year exile
sentence given meir sons
while August Stern protested
his father's sentence of eight
years, at hard labor.
Meanwhile"the GNYCSJ has
learned  that  Dr.   Stern's
other son; Viktor, has been
threatened with arrest on
"parasitism" charges by
Soviet police.
Viktor Polsky, one of the
founders and earliest
leaders of the Moscow
Jewish activists, charged
here that the Soviet
government has decided to
"put an end" to the activist
movement and as a result
''now is the worst time for
Soviet Jewish activists in the
last five years."
Polsky, who now lives in
Israel, told a press con¬
ference sponsored by the
National Conference on
Soviet Jewry that' only 800
Soviet Jews were permitted
to leave for Israel in March.
"We fear that no more than
15,000 Jews will be allowed to
come to Israel this year," he
said. |
In. another development
Grigory Goldstein, 44, and
his brother, Isay, 37, both of
: Tbilsi, have been told by
KGE officials that they will
. be    put    on    trial    for.
"parasitism" and sentenced
to three to seven-year terms,
according to the Greater
New York Conference. The
two brothers have been
seeking exit visas since 1972.
9