■iPageJO-^^ News, Thursday, August 15, 1991
M-T
etters
Jewish news
^ An independent Community Newspaper 'serving as a iorurh for diverse viewpoints:
Elul 6, 5751 - Shoftim Gandlelighting: Montreal 7:41; Toronto 8:01
TO THE EDITOR:
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Once again, the Palestinian people stand before a historic moiiieht of profound national possibility. And once again — as in 1937 with the publication of the Peel Commission Report, 1947 with the UN Par^^^^ the wake of the Six Day War, or 1977 at Camp David — it appears that the individuals purporting to lead them seem poised to spurn that moment arid let slip the possibility.
The American adrninistration has brought the countries of the Middle East to the brink of the region's first ever peace conference and bilateral negotiations. A place for the Palestinians at the peace table has been secured by the Americans and agreed to by Israel. Yet the PLQ leadership, alwaysputting itself ahead of its people, is apparently intent on seeing that long sought-after place unoccupied because it cannot fiU jt nor appK^^^^
With cHaracteristic bluster and bluff, Yasser Arafat asserts that^; "the Palestinians are the main factor in the Middle East peace equation." This is patently false, and he knows it to be. The main factor in the Middle East peace equation, as it has always been, is the relationship among the nation states in the region, arid in particular at this moment, between Syria and Israel. The Palestinians are the main factor only in the equation of a Palestinian future.
Unfortunately, as long as the PLO remains what it is, the likelihood of the flowering of that fiiture seems bleak. For its central constitutional document, the National Cbvenant, embodying the hopes, aspirations, and fundamenfal.core values to which the PLO is committed as a 'iiberatiori" organization, arid, one presumes, to which it woulil be conunit^ the leadership of a self-governing autonomous society, plainly calls for the destruction of the State Of Israel. It would be suicidal in the extreme, and certainly foolhardy and patronizing- for Israel not to accept at face value the plain meaning of these words;
Israel's refusal to riegofiate with the PLO is neither semantic, arbitrary, nor mere dogmatic ideology. Rather, it st® the highest human inoral imperative to '-choose life.';
Arafat has often boasted that he can corivene the 92-member cen-" tral committee of the PLO withiri a week. Indeed, the Palestihiari National Council, the PLO's plenary body, is meeting next month in Algeria to discuss the American peace initiative.
To begin to persuade Israel and the American administration that the PLO deserves a role in the peace process, let-Arafat,-at the September meeting, renounce the National Covenant and declare it, for all times, null and void. -
Otherwise, his legacy to his people will remain what it has always been: a seat untaken, an opportunity lost and a national tragedy perpetuated.
uring Hitler's Third Reich, Joseph Goebbels, the minister of propaganda, made over 1,400 films designed to glorify f. Nazism, celebrate the triumphs ofthe German army and — vilify Jews.
Although the latter category is represented only by a small number of such films, their virulence was of such a high order that, according to Variety correspondent Rebecca Lieb, they were used to "turn Germans against their Jewish neighbors and to inure them to the march of the Holocaust."
Debate over whether films such as Der Ewige Jude — The Eternal yew —should be made universally available today has recently surfaced with the revelation that a Chicago-based company, International Historic Films, has been advertising the sale of videos of the films in question in Spotlight, described by the Anti-Defamation League of B'nai B'rith as "the wealthiest and n«)st active anti-Semitic organization in the United States."
While the company president says that the advertisement appeared there by inadvertence, the larger issue of peoples' rights to view such material has been thrust into the public domain. The right in question is to see a film, produced in the Warsaw Ghetto in 1940, which depicts Jews as objects of scorn, derision and hatred ^
Some American Jewish groups, skittish about appearing to circumvent the First Amendment which guaranti^ firee speech, wants the German agency responsible for the distribution rights, to make them available only to the National Centre for Jewish Film (at Bran-deis University) for educational purposes. Other groups, including the ADL do not support blocking the film.
Canada's criminal code is much more specific in this regard. Our anti-hate literature statutes prohibit materials which are likely to incite the kind 6f racial hatred promoted against Jews by Goebbels and his evil coterie of collaborators.
Letters are welcome if they are brief, in English or French, typewritten with lines double spaced, and of interest to. our reading public. Readers are cautioned not to make sweeping claims against persons or institutions which they cannot verify, as libel laws are very stringent. We reserve the right to edit and condense letters, which must bear the sender's address, phone number and both handwritten and typed signatures.
THE POLY AKOW SHUL
May I add a few lines to tlie article of Rabbi Gunther Plaut, Inter-Religious Rivalry Hurts Moscow's Jewish Community (CJN June 13).
It seems the reason Jewish groups were denied permission to use the building was not the rivalry mentioned in Plaut's article but the action of the Lubavitch Chassidim. >■
As the Moscow municipality had decided in principle that all former houses of worship that were confiscated by the government during 73 years of Communist rule should be returned to the former owners, about 50 members of the Lubavitch movement took matters in therr own hands and carried out a six-hour prayer service, in this form-- er Polyakow shul on April 11; Angered by the invasion, Galina Chorkin, director of Folk Arts, closed the building for everyone.
The building over which the struggle took place was built in 1875 as a residence by a wealthy Moscow merchant and financier, named Polyakow^ who also built the "Choral shul," the only shul to stay Open in the city throughout the years of Communist power. Later Polyakow moved to a new home and arranged for the former residence to become a synagogue.
Herman Landau
Toronto
IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF MARNIE KIMELMAN
Mamie Kimelman was tragically and brutally murdered by the explosion of a terrorist pipe bomb onShabbat, July 28, 1990 on the beach of Tel Aviv. Mamie was participating in one of the Israel summer programs of the Canadian Zionist Federation's Youth & Hechalutz Department. We came to Israel with heavy hearts to retrace the last footsteps of our beloved-jd^wghter.
With the help of time, we have now come to realize that this indiscriminate and unjustifiable bmtal act of terrorism is just one in the innumerable attempts to destroy the JeWish people and their determination to survive. We call upon Jewish parents throughout the world to realize that the best living memorial for our daughter is for all Jews, everywhere, young and old alike, to visit Israel and demonstrate to the worid that ■: we will not be frightened off nor deterred from showing support for Israel, nor will we allow divisions to be created between the Jews of Israel and Diaspora Jewry by such acts of terrorism.
Join us by making your own pilgrimage in the footsteps of Mamie.
Harold and Linda Kimelman
Toronto
ARAB PERFIDIOUSNESS
Pardon my cynicism regardirig the impending talks between Irael and the Arabs. Having observed Arab perfidi-cmsness among themselves, and the action of Egypt vis-a-vis Israel in spite of a peace treaty, makes me a little wary of our Arab cousins.
I hope that the following scenario not take place as a result of Israel and Arab talks.
It is presently in Arab interest to sign a peace treaty with Israel, Syria would gain prestige, the Golan Heights and billions in U.S. aid. The Arabs would in turn cancel the boycott, but only as long as it is useful to them. They would use the Jerusalem issue and Israeli retaliation for terrorist attacks as an excuse to resume the boycott. Syria would gain everything and Israel would lose her bargaining hand, while having her most implacable neighbor on her doorstep.        • -—^
My only hope is ray strong faith in
Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir, thar the old fighter will not make peace at any price. 1 am confident that he will not be browbeaten by U.S. high pressure tactics to sign a scrap of paper without iron-clad guarantees.
Leonard Smith
Toronto
Isaac Bashevis Singer
SINGER SUPPORTED CHAI
Concern for Helping Animals in Is rael (CHAI) mourned the death of Isa ac Bashevis Singer, a staunch supporter of its work to improve conditions foi animals in Israel and a member of it: Israeli-American Advisory Board.
Singer's support for CHAl's wori drew, on his lifelong passion for preventing tsaar ba'alei chayyim. pain to living creatures.
The Nobel Prize-winning author was particulariy involved inCHAI'sefforts to secure Israeli government permission for the duty-free importing of animal ambulances by the Society for the Prevention of Cmelty to Animals (SPCA) to pick up wounded and abandoned, animals. He died without this aim having been achieved.      - -
Siijger's empathy with animals was reflected in his vegetarianism and in' many of his literacy works. It can be best exemplified by the words of a character in his story The Letter Writer. .
. . all those scholars, all those philosophers, all the leaders of the world . . . have convinced themselves that. . . all other creatures were created merely to provide (man) with food, pelts, to be tormented, exterminated . . For the animals it is an eternal ' Treblinka."     :     "t——
CHAI's address i.S-P.O:B. 3321, Alexandria, VA -22302, (703) 658-9650.
Nina Natelson
President -
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PRESERVING HISTORY ^
I would like to respond to a quote that appeared in Lou Seligson's interesting profile, (CJN, July 25). The quote-is-attributed to Eiran Harris as follows: "The past has not been recorded sufficiently . . .We have no systematic preservation of Jewish community documents in Canada. Most have been lost over the years." Please allow me to make the following clarification.
Since its beginnings in 1914, the Jewish Public Library has been preserving records and private papers of those institutions and individuals who have contributed to the cultural, educational and social life of the Jewish community.
The mandate of the Jewish Library Archives is to collect, preserve and make accessible to the community this rich cultural heritage. To date there are 69 processed collections numbering in the tens of thousands of documents that have been acquired through voluntary donations and through the efforts ofthe Library. ^
111 addition to its institutional and in-dividual^Uections, the Archives contains over 3,000 photographs depicting the history and cultural life of Montreal from the turn of the century until the present day. There is also a coUedioh of audiovisual materials.
The contents include original manuscripts, diaries, scrapbooks and
newspaper clippings from the coUecr.. tions of prominent poets, journalists, writers, musicians, professors and theatre directors. The administrative and cultural activities of schools and associations are also documented in the Archives. Carol Katz Head of Archives Jewish Public Library Montreal
COUS-GOUS VERSUS VOUZ-VOUZ
Bom in Casablanca, adopted by the Ashkenazi community 28 years ago, I am comfortable davening in both rites and comfortable evolving in both segments of the Montreal Jewish community. In these vrying culturo-linguistic times, I believe some harmonization between die Sephardi and the Ashkenazi communities is in order. As I wish to reach both the English and the French reader, I shall communicate in both languages.
Peut-etre cette m^thode d'expression contribuera au bilinguisme auquel nous aspirons tant. Juillet 1991 n'est pas le moment propice aux recriminations, aux reglements de comptes, aux harangues, aux accusations et aux blames d'uri cote envers I'autre. Plutot. les leaders ashk€nases et sepharades devraient mettre en evidence leurs meillejurs atouts afin de gen^rer un syn-ergisme qui, enti-e autre, accroitrera la-chance de preserver notre mode de vie au Quebec et au Canada.
In times of crisis. Jewish people have always risen to the occasion and have displayed strength in solidarity and this served them. well historically. However, it is regretable that we become a little lackadaisical in our cooperative efforts after a crisis is over. Instead, inmy near-utojpian Vision of both my communities, relatively quiescent times should be spent building bridges and resolving our differences to better tackle the next crisis.
Ayant €t^€lev^ dans Tune et forte-ment influenc€ par rautre, mes deux sous-cultures juives ni'oni permis de B6neficier dU meilleir dedeux mondes. Rienn'emp^heunecommunaut6d'ex-primer son caractere distinct afinqu'il puisse fetre apprecie par I'autre communaut^ et vice-versa... :^
Etcomme I'asi bien exprim6 Khalil Gibran:
* 'C616brons nos differences — Let's celebrate our differences." Avi ben Mordechai Montreal
There is a story In almost every Jewish surname and TorcMito lawyn* FRED M. CATZMAN has been researching their origins over the past few years. Mr. Catzman reports on his research in The CJN.
WEINER - WIENER
Here are two familiar surnames Avhich would appear to have Uie same meaning witii a variation in spelling." In fact, their origin and sigiiificance are poles apart.
Wine was both a synonym for Joseph and a traditional sacrament in Jewish life. It gave rise to a host of surnames, including Weiner. a vintner.
Wiener, Qn the other hand, is a topo-nym — a name derived from a country or district. It denotes a Viennese — a person from Vienna, which is an anglicized version of Wien.
There are many such names that designate origin from certain cities, such as Krakauer from Krakow; War-shawer ftom Warsaw; Prager from Prague; Posner from Posen; and Dan-ziger from Danzig (now Gdansk).
And the hoc dog twins: Hamburger from Hamburg; and Frankfiirter firom Frankfurt.' -