Page.2 - Tlve Candian Jewish News, Thursday, October 30, 1980
M—T
Nov. 4 - U.S. election
By RABBI W. GUNTHER PLAUT
. Next week it will be all over , . ..the American, people will have e.xpressedtheir.presidential preference.
. In Israel, people call Nov. 4 "dopmsllay."
which denotes the cynical yiew that when the ne.xt
President no longer heeds the Jewish vote he-will . proceedto.coddle.the
Arabs as is the
general practice in
Europe, and as the oil
interests would urge .him todo.
"I love Israel." he
proclaims now. duly
attire.d with a ya'r-. mulke: or "I will
recognize Jerusalem
as Israel's capital"
(shades of Joe Rabbi GuritherPlaut
Clark!), and by such pronouncements he hopes to
capture the hearts and minds of U.S. Jews and
have thism mark their .\'. in the right spot next
Tuesday.
Presidential cariipaigns are in a largi- measure built on simplisitic foundation^, most of them amounting to ■"promise now, and worry about it later." The matter of capturing the elusive Jewish vote is largely characterized by this approach.
This, of course, raises a number of questions: Is there a Jewish vote altogether?.!! so. do Reagan, Carter and .-Anderson have essentially different views on matters believed to be of importance to Jews?
It would be foolish to deny that Jews consider certain issues to influence their vote. Evenone does, and so do Jews. All other things being even, a candidate's pronounced view (or record) on Israel does make a difference to Jews. But note: they make a decisive difference only if they are the overriding issues and other considerations fall into subordinate places.
It appears to me that U.S^ Jews on the whole believe that, as i-egards Israel, the candidates do not differ greatly from-each other. Which is to say that Jews will generally cast their votes on domestic issues, party preference, and their perception of the candidates as personalities.
I do not pretend to know how my co-reiigionists in the United States view the contestants as individuals fit to run the country- • do know, however that traditionally Jews have overwhelmingly
voted Democrat and therefore, I think, other tiiatters being more or less even, the\\will likely do so again. : ^ ■
Consider how, for instance, they voted in 1952-and 1972. In 1952, Republican Gen. Dwight Eisenhower, hailed as the liberator of the cohceritra'tioh camps-and friend of the survivors, ran against Adlai Stevenson, whose views oh Israel were rather ambiguous. Nonetheless,. Eisenhower received less than 40% of the Jewish vote (as far as the surveys could ascertain).
In 1972, George McGovern was the Democratic candidate against President Richard Ni.xbn. While the latter was perceived as a proven friend of Israel, and even, received' the not-so-hidden endorserhent of Israeli leaders, McGovern — whose views oh Israel were ambiguous like Stevenson'shad been — ran with the Jewish vote.
ThereJFore. my prediction is that President Carter will. as a Democrat, continue to be successful with Jewish voters.
Those who will vote Republican (and their number is increasing as Jews achieve an entrenched economic position) will do so for domestic reasons; and those who will vote for Anderson will cast their ballots also on issues that are not identifiable specifically Jewish,
In the key states where Jews have ah electoral impact, things will therefore not change much in this regard. Jews in New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Callfoniia and Florida will largely vote Democrat as they have done In the past.
There is one additional reas:6n why this will be so. The neo-canservatiyes who might ordinarily attract uncommitted Jewish voters are vociferously supported by certain Christian crusaders. These new political pressure groups — like Christian Voice. Moral Majotity, Religious Roundtable rate all candidates according to cetiain "moral" principles which, they assert, have divine approval.
Curiously, the crusaders have views not-only on such matters as homosexuality and abortion, but also on the Panama Canal treaty and detente, all in the name of religion. Without exception these movements come squarely down on the side of Reagan andhis supporters.
Which gives Jews another reason to have a long look at the former governor from California, before they give him their vote. That he may emerge as the ne.xt President of the United States, is therefore a matter of serious concern.
Yeshiva attracts non-obsefvarit Jews
OSes
polls show more plan to leave
By MARCIA KRETZMER
JERUSALEM —
In the heart of the Jew-. ish quarter of the Old City, of Jerusalem, stands the - Aish Hat or ah Yeshiva.'
Every day. rabbis from Aish Hatorah descend the winding ajleys and flights of stairs to the Western Wall seeking out young tourists of uncertain Jew-iish identity, to whom the visit to the Wall is simply part of the tourist circuit. When the rabbis find thern, they invite, them to the yeshiya.for a cup ot coffee and a chat about what they know and how much they care about the religion and the , people into which they were born;
For the majority of young people h is the first genuine encounter with their own heritage. Some, wanting to delve deeper, stay on to devote themselves to severial months or more, of serious study. Of these, a portion become baalei t,eshuvah — non-observant Jews who decide to lead fully Orthodox lives.
In the last six years • some 13,000 people have passed through Aish Hatorah. one of three yeshi-vot founded in Israel by a dvnamic rabbi from the U.S.. Rabbi Noach Weinberg, who asks of.Jewish youth only that they take the time to examine intelligently just what it is that Judasim issayirig. . •
Though Aish Hatorah reaches out mainly to Jewish youth from abroad, Israelis tod — army peo- . pie, kibbutzniks, scien.-tistSi, actors and artists — have responded to its message. The most noteworthy of this gronp is undoubtedly Uri Zohar, until a few years back a top Is-
group washes dishes, anr other does bookkeeping.. Sometimes their wives, hold jobs.. 1 sold my house, m Tel Aviv and-I-niake the occasional advertising film. .:
CJN: Who maintains thieveshiva?
Zohar: The Almighty, blessed be He. We have a few devoted contributors and supporters.
CJN: Does Aish Hatorah charge fees?
Zohar: According to the Torah this is not allowed. The yeshiva tries to be father and mother, educator, hotel, restaurant and shadchaii (matchmaker) to
Uri Zohar
its students. We, are engaged in a war of survival more tremendous than
are
after US. alerted
By SHELDON KIRSHNER
Of ail of Israel's many problems, emigration' —
■ or yerida — is now being Tecognize.d by the government as. one of the most serious,
Increasing numbers of Israelis are leaving the Jewish sta;ie. at a time when appeals for aliya by politicians are falling on deaf ears. '
All: sorts of figures are bandied .about-.; but the conservative: estimate is . that 400.000. Israelis .are living abroad. The Sunday Timesof London Says that . 800,000 Israelis, one :in every five, jive overseas; ■
In a recent profile on the subject. Time Magiazhie noted that at least 400,000 Israelis reside in the U.S. alone. According to the best available:. information, Canada is home to approxima:tely .30,000 to 40,000 IsraeUs, the majority of theni in Toronto and Montreal.
Israel's Central Bureau of Statistics^ tlairhs that . 12.000 Israelis emigrated last year, icompared ,to 28,000 .'immigrants.. But the figures are deceiving, as they do not include the children of yordim born abroad (who. automatically acquire Israeli citizenship
■ and passports).
More important is the . fact that the figures are compiled against the yardstick :off6ur years "..permanent tininterrupted sojourn outside the. country. In other words, . an Israeli living abi-.oad who • returns to visit his family,; . or.for' a holiday once in ■ four years, will not be : . calculated to.have left.. Ha'aretz, the :Tsrael. daily, published a- poll recently and the results were not .encouraging! . . ^The newspaper found that 4.9%. or 98,000, of the Jewish--pppulationpver— the age of 18 intended-to. leave in the : foreseeable future. Another 6% answered"maybe" to the question. In 1976, a Ha'aretz siirvey-rdiisclosed that 2.2% were plaJnniiig ~ to emigrate., while 2.8% were (»nsidering it. /
El Al, bfaeFs iMtioiial •bUncv reports that tfiere has been; a significant -^jiuiip In tibe nnmber of IjuadUs pndhaslng oneway tkkcisvpaiticnlaiiy to New T«k; iviieTO>uts of m^llliboriioods, arev oom-
posed almost exclusively of IsraeUs,
.And at the U.S. embassy's visa office in Tel Aviv, long lines of Israelis form'asearly as 3 a.m. In response, recently, na-ticinallsticyouths mounted a demonstration in front of the embassy. "Yerida is tre.asQh," they chainted. ."Have a safe trip, but .don't forget to conie ■ home." ■'
U.S! consular officials say that a.lot of the Israelis go to the United States as tourists and: stay on to , become illegal aliens. . Green cards, which entitle an iriimigrant t6 live in:the U.S.. have becom'e the tickets to the "prorriis-ed land'' for many Israelis . \vh6 could not otherwise : qualify for residency; Law-. ■ yers- in' New York, Chicago.' Los .Angeles and Detroit.have grown rich by : "providing the service in.,-ways not always legal; : ■V'erida, or going .'down, ..is a sensitive word in the .' Hebrew vocabulary, since eniigrafion is essentially a', negation of Zionism and Israeli riatioh-building.'
But emigration,, obviously, is ■ a perennial .feature of life in Israel;. .: Long before the advent of .statehood, Jewish im-. mjgrants.in Palestine..fed up with conditions there or : : an.xious'to. strike it rich.in:.. the biaspbra, were leaving the Jewish homeland ' en masse. Indeed, the ..classic^caseqfyerida is the Second Aliya at the begin- , nirigofthiscentury. Ninety ' percent:! of the Je:ws who ';: were part,- of this human ■ wave returned to Eastern ^ Eiifope .after spending .various lengths of timein Palestine. An immigrant. '']who stayed was David Gruen, later known as David Ben-Gurion. .
:in the wakefOf Israel's/ independence,^ : when v timeisi^were^roiighj. Je5^h__ immigrants often used the -country as ; a half-way; -house until they conld obtain y.S. or Canadian : visas. And in the. liiid-19608J when a recession hit Israel, still ibore Israelis emigrated for what they' thought would be -greener pastures in the Diaspora.
Official emigration is said: to have reached a peak in 1974, when 17,000^ departed in the demora|i:^ ing aftermath of the^om Kippur War. Smce then.
with, fluctuations, the number of Israelis leaving
, has been quite high.
The question arises: why? Some say they are weary of the gloomy economic news. Last year's inflation rate was 134%. and there are no signs on
•the horizori that it is diminishing. Labor politicians argue that ..the Likud .government's new economic policy has created the widespread feeling that "tomorrow .will \not get better." ■ . Israelis in the mood.to emigrate ' also . point to reserve duty in the.arrhed forces, the uncertainty, of . the: political and military situation in the Middle East and the deteriorating-
.quality; of life in the big cities.
. .Today's'emigrants are reportedly: more :eciijcated . than those of the past. In ; their ranks are. a^ higher percentage of professionals like doctors and-:.accountants,.businessrnen . and white-collar workers, eager ;to improve their ■ economic.: status in the goldenne medina. ,
Even Jewish Agency emissaries have joined thie. e.xodus in reverse.The Jewish'.Agency is clearly ■embarrassed that several of its officials in North: America have settled in . the liiaspora instead of, retiirnihg home at the .end : of their tii^ur of duty-i ■
. On the whole, Israelis don't do badly m their
adopted homelands. A handful, however, find themselves in dire finan-cial straits. And there are those who turn to crime. In West Germany, IsraeUs are said to be relatively well represented in the underworld. And in south-em California, an ''Israeli: mafia" has emerged, according to the. state's attorney-general.
Israeli politicians deplore emigration., In 197.7, Yitzhak Rabin, then prime minister, probably. spoke for ■countrymen when he described yordim as "renegades." But while most ministers pay lip serviceto the causes and remedies of emigration., few .hiave shown . up. for Knesset debates dealing with the problem. / ^
A couple.of years ago,. the government sponsored :a program: designed to lure Israelis: back to israeh But it was. not a success'. .:.:
Geula Cohen,, the fiery :;rightrwing- Knesset .inem-' ber, suggests that yordim •should be: ''excomrhuni-cated". fronv the. Jewish communities inwhich they live., "'I cut off relations with my .sister- for leaving the country,", she says;
But most' Jews In the , Diaspora, though con- : cerhed.at the iskyrpcketing emigration thinning Israel, will probably reject Ms. Cohen's gratoitous advice.. ; Zionism,: they realize. Is a two^wiy road.
raeli actor, fihn producer and TV entertainer, welLi-c known for his flamboyanTf^ " ° P ^ " " originality and radical political views.' Today, Zohar and his family have 'moved from their large Tel Aviv home to an apartment in one of Jenis. alem'is'religiotis neighbor-: hoods where they maut-tain a strictly observant walvoflife.
the CJN visited Uri Zo-
NEWYORK —
Belgian neo-Nazis, in the U.S. to address a National States Rights I'.iny meeting in Marietta. Georgia, were deported Oyt. 12, after the Anti-,. Defamation League of B'nai B'rith alerted the U.S. state department to their presence and asked that their visas be re-\oked. ,
.-\DL had informed Secretary of State Edmund .Muskic that Armapd Hrjksson. head of the Flemish Vlaamse Militan-tcn Orde (VMO), and his associate. Roger Spinne-wijn, would be speakers at the Oct. 11 National States Rights Party conference;
In a telegram to Muskie, Justin J. Finger, director of the League's civil rights division, noted that the ^ VlO is the organization uhich annually plays host ■o meetings in Belgium of neo-Nazi groups;, including the French organization which took credit for the synagogue's bombing in Paris in which several persons were killed,:
. Declaring that the VMO. itselif, has a record of viojcnce, Finger.asked thatthc visas be Revoked. He said their presence
harat AishHatorah to find "would be highly undesirr out what induced him; to able, particulariy at a time
£.\change, his showbiz career for the world of Torah and mitzvot. . Zohar: Afriend of mine, nori-religious and of very ■ leftHving opinions, began : to work on me, challenge . me. Through him: I began -to study with a rabbi here ; in Jerusalem. He in tlirn . led me to . Rifabi Noach Weinberg. U is simply im- , possible to refuse Rabbi . Noach 'Weinberg. He's a • magnificent person .■. He -just won.'t give • iip. He: . brings young Jews here —.. Ma0ists, Ti-otskyites:: ; Tibetan.monks; astrophysicists -—: and argues with: theni patiently, point by ■ : point; :■:/,■■'\ '/v T'"'
.CJNV But'in your case.-; you Haveri't decided only to keep the mitzyot, you have made Torah study your life. How do you and ; the other members of the Israeli- group make a living?' ■■■■ ■■■■■<';■'■ Zohar: Oiie actor in our
whefi the world is still in shock over the recent terrorist attacks in
man
Europe; and more espc: cially so because these two ■ leaders of one of the principal extremist groups inte:nd to address an American organization with its own 25-year record of bigotry and violence."
In press statements, Joe Reap, a state department spokesrnan, said ADL's request that the visas be revoked was granted because the presence of the men in question "was not; in accordance with the public interest."
Accompanying them to the airport when they were leaving was J. B. Stoner, head of. the NSRP, who was quoted as saying: "I apologize for the Jews running you out of the country." He also referred to the Belgian neo-Nazis as "good white Christians.'' :
ADL's telegram to: Muskie described the Na-,itional States Rights Party as an "avowedly racist and anti-Jewish orgahiza-. tion headed by J. B; Stpner; who was recently; convicted in the bombing of a black church in Alabama^" .
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any we have engaged in— including the Yom Kippur war. And this kind of war has a clear distinguishing mark: everything is against' Us. AH the divisions of the enemy.
CJN: What do you mean by the enemy, the forces of seculairism or aissimila-tlon?
Zohar: No, I actually mean The Enemy, The Othier Side.' Anyone not prepared to sacrifice something of himself to carry out the requirements of the Torah is serving The Other Side.
CJN: Isn't this a mystical or chassidic belief? Is everything so black and • white? He who is not for the Torah is against it?
Zohar: There Is no middle; A yonng couple came to me once for Shabbat, a biochemist and a teacher. We argued aU Shabbat bdt notliing came of it. But a month later, they began lieeplng: the nciitzvot: prayed regularly, ate kosher. The amaziiig thing was that one step inside and they could.no longer even comprehend' how they felt before. The moment they made the crucial step they were already in a different world.
CJN: You seem to be talking about a conversion experience.
Zohar: No. A person need not be aware the change has taken place. It is riot an experience or a revelation. It's a cognitive process.
CJN: But are .you claiming that for a person who
has made the comniitment there are no_conflicts or doubts, that air problems are resolved?—
Zohar: Life is an incessant process of advances, trials and conflicts. That's how the-Almighty made the world. But each time you triumph you have.the supreme satisfaction -— there's no translation for the Hebrew word "osher" — of the Almighty's se^l of approval on your pro^ gress. And that's the only true happiness. : CJN: You are an artist, an actor, producer. Isn't it a shame to forsake your talent? Don't you sometimes regret the contribution you could still make?
Zohar: The question is, what kind of contribution? The world of entertainment conforms to Aris-tole's definition of catharsis. You gp to see a performance and you participate in a certain kiiid of experience. Your emotions have ^n outlet .But nothing comes of it. Entertainment means playing, scattering.
The Torah pushes you in the opposite direction, .to positive action and concentration of energies.
True, lam an artist, and perhaps that's why one of my most fulfilling experiences was the study of the Song Songs with the coriimentaries of the Gaon of Vilna. I was bver-whelmed by its magnificent structures, its perfection, its artistry.'
CJN: Yoii wereonce politically active and through yoiir work you influenced people. Vou talk about the desperate plight of Jewry. What about the desperate plight of Israel? Why have you cut yourself off from political life?
Zohar: I don't know that I was so influential. Political action on my part would be irrelevant be--cause I think that the only way out of our problems Is to return to i>eing an "Am Yehudi" — a Jewish peo-
pie. ;■■
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