Ohio Jewish chronicle. (Columbus, Ohio), 1984-03-01

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1982  VELMA  AVE.
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VOL. 62   NO. 9
MARCH 1,1984-ADAR127
Devoted to American
and Jewish Ideals,
Some Improvement
Seen In Condition
Of Ethiopian Jews
NEW YORK (JTA) - The
president of the North American Conference on Ethiopian Jewry (NACEJ). said
here that there has been
some improvement in the
situation of Ethiopian Jews
living in the Gondar province since her last visit to
the region in 1981.
However, Barbara Riba-
kove cautioned in an interview with the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that while
some conditions have improved, she was not suggesting that the situation of
Ethiopian Jewry had
reached what she described
as an , "acceptable" situation.
She explained that in the
villages she visited for eight
days last January, synagogues were now open after
having been closed by the
government in 1981. Falasha
children are attending government  operated  schools
(CONTINUED ON PAGE 4)
Saudi Arabia Gives Money To PLO
LONDON (JTA)—-Saudi Arabia recently gave a check for
$28.5 million to the Al Fatah representative in Riyadh as its
latest installment of financial support for the PLO, the World
Jewish Congress reported.
Soviet POC Faces More Problems
NEW YORK (WNS)—Former Soviet Jewish Prisoner of
Conscience Grigory Goldshtein, a physicist from Tbilisi, may
face a new three to five years prison term, according to information obtained by the National Conference on Soviet Jewry
(NCSJ). Accused of taking advantage of his position at the '
Central Bureau of Statistics, he was informed that his file
was transferred to a local prosecutor. The NCSJ reported
that Goldshtein protested the move with a detailed letter to
the First Secretary of the Georgia Republic's Communist
Party. 	
Hamburg Declares
Concentration Camp Monument
BONN (JTA)—The authorities of the city-state of Hamburg have decided to declare the former Neuengamme concentration camp a historical monument, ending, a prolonged
controversy over whether to continue to lease the site for
commercial activities. Considerable pressure had been
brought to bear by various groups to create a memorial to the
55,000 inmates who died at Neuengamme, out of a total of
106,000 incarcerated there between 1939-1945. According to
the_ authorities the victims were "worked to death." The
former factory that used slave labor will be rebuilt as a me-
 .^.. ■ -.-~.  — .    morial and exhibition hall.	
Implications Of Concordat Between
Italy And Catholic Church Explored
©claimed Israeli Writer Says
West Bank Palestinian State
Is Solution To Mideast Conflict
ROME (JTA)—The new
Concordat just agreed to by
the Italian State and the Roman Catholic Church will
have wide implications for
the Italian Jewish community, including control of its
ancient cultural and historical heritage in Rome.
The  Concordat,   signed
Feb. 18 by Premier Bettino
Craxi, leader of the Socialist
Party, and Cardinal Agos-
tino Casaroli, the Vatican
secretary of state,  establishes a~ clear demarcation
between the temporal and
religious  powers  of  the
Church and advances religious pluralism in Italy. It is
by and large a revision and
up-dating of the 1929 Concordat  signed  between  the
Church and Mussolini regime which formalized Roman  Catholicism   as -the
State religion.
Under the new Concordat,
this is; no. longer this .case.
Catholic religious instruction is no longer compulsory
in Italian public schools,
The revised relationship (
between Church and State
will affect the so-called
"mini-concordats" between
the State and non-Catholic
faiths which are also up for
revision. Italian Protestants
— mostly Waldensian and
Methodist—will sign revised
agreements with thegovern-
ment next week. The Union
of Italian Jewish Communities is lagging behind.
No date has been set for a
definitive revision, mainly
because ah existing draft
still contains several points
of controversy within the
Jewish community itself.
But the Concordat between
the Catholic Church and the
State contains several articles which will doubtlessly
serve as guidelines for Jewish requests' for revisions.
Roman Catholicism is no
longer "the sole religion of
the Italian State" nor are
other religions merely "permitted." In principle, all religions now have equal
rights. Primary and secondary public school classes
in "the Catholic religion"
are no longer "compulsory,"
witn students of other faiths
or ideologies being allowed
"exemption" from religious
instruction.
The teaching of "the Catholic religion" is still guaranteed by the government but
as an elective subject. By the
same token, a revised agreement with the Jewish community could provide governmental  guarantees  for
the teaching of "the Jewish
'■   religion" in public schools,
. at the request of students
and  parents/ Students  of
theology  remain  deferred
from military service, as are
university  students  generally. The clergy may per-:
forjn civil service in place of
military service or be exempt; or clergy may serve
as chaplains with the armed
forces. It follows that the
same rights and privileges
(some already granted) will
be valid for Jewish schools,
rabbinical'seminarians and
the Jewish "clergy" when
the final revision is drafted.
Of special interest to the
Jewish  community   is  the
(CONTINUED ON PAGE 15)
NEW YORK (JTA) —The
establishment of a Palestinian state is . a "historical
must" and Israelis should
reconcile themselves to this
because it is the only way to
solve the Middle East conflict.
•  This is the view of one of
Israel's   most  acclaimed
writers,   A. B.   Yehoshua,
.who is highly respected in
political and intellectual Israeli circles. A member of
Jthe Labor Party, Yehpshua
is  the  recipient of many
awards for his short stories,
novels, and plays. He i§ cur1
rently in the United States on
a short visit for the publication of the English translation of his latest novel, A;
Late Divorce  (Doubleday,
$16.95).
In an interview with the
Jewish Telegraphic Agency,
Yehoshua, a sixth-generation sabra, said: "The only
solution' to the Palestinian
problem is the establishment
of a demilitarized Palestinian state in the West
Bank. The solution of a
Palestinian state is an historical must."
According to Yehoshua, it
is preferable for Israel to
deal directly with the Pales
tinians rather than with King
Hussein of Jordan about the
future of the West Bank. He
pointed out that a Jordanian-
Israeli pact on the West
Bank which does not take
into consideration the wishes
of the Palestinians who live
in the area will not solve the
Palestinian problem.
. Direct Negotiations Are ■
Preferable  "
- The  Palestinians,   he
claimed, will not feel bound
by any agreement reached
between Israel and Jordan
and a situation might deyel- '■:
op in which PLO leader
Yasir Arafat would return to
the West Bank after the area
is returned to Hussein, without being committed toa settlement with Israel.
"I therefore believe that
direct negotiations with the
Palestinians on the future of
the .West Bank is better, as
far as Israel is concerned^
than dealing with Hussein,"
he said.
Yehoshua, who is a profes-
:    (CONTINUED ON PAGE 11)
Philip Bornstein Named
Beth Jacob'Man Of Year'
Philip Cohen, president of
the Beth Jacob Brotherhood,
announced that Philip Bornstein will be the recipient of
Israeli Scholar To Visit
Columbus In March, April
held oh Tuesday, March 27,
at 7:30 p.m.
Irv Flox, chairman of the
concert, said that Cantor
Benzion Miller "super star
cantor" who replaced Cantor Moshe Koussevitzky, will
be the star entertainer for
the evening. Appearing with
Cantor Miller will be Cantor Elwin Redfern of Beth
Jacob.
(CONTINUED ON PAGE 4)
World's First Torah
During the months of
March and April, 20 top Israeli scholars are going to
Amnon Shamosh
visit different Jewish communities in the United States
through the Scholar-in-Residence program sponsored by
the Jewish Agency.
!    Columbus will serve as
host for a week to Amnon
' Shamosh who is a novelist,
short story writer and one of
the cultural elite in Israel.
Shamosh will be in Columbus from March 26' through
■ April 3, ahd he will speak at
different synagogues, Jewish organizations, University
groups and so on.
1
Shamosh  was   born  in
Syria. His family came to Israel when he was almost
nine. He was a member of a
pioneer  youth  movement,
and he joined the Palmach
brigade. Upon completion of
his studies, he became one of
the founders of the Kibbutz
Maayan  Baruch  on  the
Syrian-Lebanese  border
where he worked as shepherd, Kibbutz secretary arid
school principal. Shamosh is
a graduate of the Hebrew
University and. has represented the Kibbutz Movement and UNESCO in Europe, Africa and the United
States.
Shamosh began writing at
the age of 40, after being relieved of his duties as district
high school master and from
key kibbutz positions. He has
, become one of Israel's most
prolific writers, averaging a
book each year, and is a
prominent figure in the new
wave of writers, from Oriental countries who have added
a fresh color to Hebrew literature. His most important
'   books   are:   Michel  Esra
■ SafraandSons (a novel), My
Sister, My Bride and Cane
(CONTINUED ON PAGE 15)
Philip Bornstein >
the "Man of the Year"
award presented annually
by the Beth Jacob Brotherhood, The presentation will
take place at the 22nd Annual -Music Concert to be
Wiesenthal Announces
Campaign To Pressure
Chile To Expel Nazi
WASHINGTON (JTA) -
Nazi-hunter Simon Wiesenthal announced here that an
international campaign has ,
been launched by the Simon
Wiesenthal Center at Yeshiva University in Los Angeles
to exert pressure on the government of Chile to expel a
former Nazi official, Walter
Rauff, who has been living in
Santiago since 1958.
Wiesenthal said the campaign is taking the form of
distributing some 1.5 million
cards showing a wanted poster of Rauff and a photo of a
camouflaged mobile gas van
bearing the symbol of the
Red Cross. The card is captioned, "Chile Protects Nazi
Mass Murderer."
The  vans,   invented  by
(CONTINUED ON PAGE 13)
NEW YORK (JTA)—For
the first time in history, a
system to mark and identify
Torah scrolls has been devel-
olped, it was announced here
last week at a press conference by Rabbi Israel Miller,
honorary chairman of the
Universal Torah Registry
(UTR).
The registry system, using
micro-perforations, marking-
paste and a Certificate of
Registry, is the culmination
of nearly three years of research by .chemists, crypt-
ologists, computer scientists
and security experts. Their
search was guided by principles laid down by leading
rabbinic authorities, Miller
said. "It represents a unified
response by all facets of the
Jewish community to a most
serious problem," he said.
Miller pointed out that
"Our aim is to ensure that
each Torah in the United
States, Canada, Israel and
around the world has a
unique code and a corresponding Certificate of Registry." '
.. The UTR was created in
consultation with synagogue, rabbinic, communal
and law enforcement groups
coordinated by the Jewish
Community Relations Coun-
(CONTINUED ON PAGE 15)