2 — THE BULLETIN — Thursday, "May 20,1993
By HUGHORGEL
TEL AVIV (JTA)pr^ The son of notoriousNazileader Martin Bortnann has left Israel after a four-day unpubUeized visit aimed at reconcijing children of Nazi criminals with cKiIdreir^of:^ Holocaust Survivors.
Martin Borniia:nn Jr., eldest son of the man who played a leading role in carrying oiit the extermination oir Europeian Jews in his capacity as Hitler's aide, joined eight other children of Nazi war criminals in meetings with nine children of Holocaust siirviyors at a fpur-day symposium.
The symposium was held at Nieve Shalom, a model community in which Arabs and Jews live and work together: It ivas arranged by a BenrGurion University psychologist. Professor Dan Bar-bn, who is author of a book about the guilt felt by descendants of Adolf Hitler's henchmen.
NEW YORK^ Prominent among thousands of marchers in the Salute to Israel parade along New York's Fifth Avenue on Lag B'Omer were contingents from the city's Jewish schools bearing aloft placards urging freedom for Jonathan Pollard.
Wherever the banner-bearing groups of youth doing precision marching were sighted all along the route, people spontaneously singled them out with clapping. Ramaz High School's placard was chanted aloud by those lining the route: "Free Jonathan Pollard Now".
At the same time the city conimission of Miami Beach joined the city councils of Los Angeles and New York Gity {see JWB May 13) in voting a unanimous resolution urging President Glinton to revie\y Pollard's sentence and consider commuting it to time served 1 "Any government purpose for incarcerating Pollard has already been served by his past seven years in prison," the motion stated. , Meanwhile, New York State assemblyman Sam Golman has requested a meeting with U.S. President Bill Glinton to hand-deliver a letter signed by over 50 N.Y. state legislators urging commutation of Pollard's ;■   life sentence. .■;
"Members of the New York State Legislature feel that Mr. Pollard's sentence was unduly harsh and; severe when compared to others convicted of the same or similar crimes/' Golman, a, Democrat, said in a letter to the White House. *T believe that President Clinton's compassion and concern for fairness will ensure that he will listen to pur request and weigh the evidence and information fairly." . Golman said other Legislatures and other county leaders have expressed interest in joining him to meet the president on behalf of Pollard.
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Solly hadpbtained a length of cloth and decided to have a suit made. He went to see Golbergthe Tailor and aisked him to make the suit for him. Golberg measured the material and said he couldn't do it as there wasn't enough material.
He thought he would try ianother tailor and so he went to Shapii'o who, after measurirtg the material, said he could do
-it.' • .■'v; v^-y:^r'7        ',
He had a fitting and a fe\y days later went to collect his
suit. As he entered the shop, he noticed the tailor's Httle boy was wearing a new suit made from his material. He said nothing and tried on the suit, which fitted perfectly.
Soily was very pleased ^nd said to the tailor, "How come you could make su6h a beautiful suit for me and one for your little boy as well, and Golberg told me that I hadn't enough niaterial?"
"Wefl/'said Shapiroi, "Golberg has two sons." ^ Told at Workers For Zion humor night
Bar-On said he qrganized the symposium to see whether the offspring of criminals and those of their victims can coexist.
Bormann Jr., who is 63, is a former priest and current ^theology teacher. He was quoted in the d&ily Yediot Achronot Sis saying he found it easier to faqe Israelis, whose anger and pain he" could accept, than present-day neo-Nazis in Germany who seek to harm him. ;
Bormann said he wais not recogriized when he visited the Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial in Jerusalem!
"My feeling was one of mourning, especially at the place where the narnes of children are listed," he said.. "A painful thought went through me, that there are thousands more victims nobody knows about. Entire families were erased."
The elder Bormann was sentenced to death in absentia at the N uremberg war
crimes trials in 1946, but where and when he died remains unclear. :
One common opinion, held by the younger Bormann as well, is that the Nazi leader conimitted suicide in Hitler's bunker at the end of World War IL
However, there was a recent report that he died of cancer in Paraguay in 1945.
Bormann Jr. said he had mixed feelings about his father. "He was a good father to his children, and on . the other hand he was an unknown quantity to me. I knew then that he had a high position but not what he really did," Bormann Jr. said. "As a religious man, I dan say that only G-d in heaven can judge him. I cannot," he added.
w^r&just
JERUSALEM (JTA) — An Arab gunman attacked a Jewish couple here in one of the few such incidents since the government banned Palestinian Arabs from the Territories frdm entering Israel proper a month ago.
Sheftel Vinokurov, 49-year-bld husband, was shot in the shoulder while he and his wife were out taking a walk with their dog.
Vinokurov, who emigrated with his wife, Alvira, from Leningrad in :1977, said he normally takes his gun with him on such walks but neglected to do so this time.
After the assailant shot Vinokurov, he pbinted the gun at the woman, but Vinokurov lunged toward the attacker and also released his bull terrier dog.
The attacker fired the gun, but missed the woman and fled.
The assailant appeared to run toward the nearby village of Beit Jala. The army imposed a curfew on the village, but lifted it after no suspects were found.
Richard Cohen Associates
HELLO, DALAI: Rabbi Alexander Schindler (top right), president, Union of American Hebrew Congregations, greets Tibet's exiled Dalai Lama before introducing him to delegates at the biennial "Consultation on Conscience" of Reform Judaism'1n Washington. The Dalai Lama praised Israel and the Jews "for their ability to survive and retain their identity despite oppression." Bottohfi: UAHC senior vice-president Rabbi Daniel Syme (left) Introduces exiled Haitian president Jean-BertrandArlstide. Father Aristide, a Roman Catholic priest who had studied in Israel, lauded the Jewish state for its adherence to democratic values. He opened and closed his remarks in fluent Hebrew.
Gadliafi ct^^^
JERUSALEM (JTA) — Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres has challenged Libyan leader Moam-mar Gadhafi to join the Middle East peace process and prove his claim that he has changed his approach to Israel.
Peres made the qpmmerits in reaction tb news ; reports that Gadhafi had invited former Libyan Jews in Israel to visit their home country and was offering compensation for property the Jews had left behind in Libya, Peres added that Israelwould welcome Libyan pilgrims to Israel's holy places, just as it would welcome any Moslem pilgrims from other parts of the world. .
Gadhafi's reported gesture to former Libyan Jews would parallel moves by another north African country, Morocco, which has allowed Israelis of M oroccan origin to visit the country without any visas, under the claim that they are still Moroccan citizens.
The comments by Peres and Gadhafi came after other reports in the media that Libya was interested in Joining the multilateral working groups in the peace process, but was reluctant to announce it publicly.
Peres described as "interesting" several measures Gadhafi has taken recently, which the foreign minister said were designed to please the United States.
Israel Sun.
WHILE StILL Israel's education minister, Shulamit AlonI meets two excited students on a visit to the high school in Rabat, a Negey Bedouin town. Under a deal last week between Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and his two coalition partners, Aloni became a minister without portfoiio pending a compromise agreement. The Meretz minister wh6 temporarily "deposited*' her educatibn portfoiio in Rabin's hands, sparked the crisis by criticizing Rabin's recitation of the Shema Wsrae/ prayer at the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising commemoration last month.
Terrorist tal-gets
TEL AVIV Israelifor-ces continued their ongoing policy pf striking terrorist bases in southern Lebanon, attacking targets north of the border security zone. Israeli helicopters struck buildings north of the zone in Tibnit village, known to be a stronghold of Iranian-backed Shi'ite Hezbollah organization. •
JERUSALEM — Bowing to pressure from building contractors, the government is now ready to allow foreign construction workers into Israel to replace Palestinian laborers who have been banned during the ongoing closure of the Administered Territories.
Pollard clemency
SAN FRANCISCO
Archbishop John R. Qiiinn ; of San Francisco has appealed to U.S. President Bill Glinton to extend clemency to former navy analyst Jonathan Pollard "as a humanitarian gesture."
The Roman Catholic archbishop observed in a. letter to Clinton, "I do not believe [giving clemency] wouldcall the court's judgment into question," he ^yrote. ', "A commutation of his sentence would be a strong sign of forgiveness and reconciliation, a sign of hope which we need in our world," Quinn concluded.
Mi. confab waters stormy
GENEVA — Anihterna^ tiohal conference on Middle East water resources convened here and ended in discord, with Palestinian Arabs saying they would not participate in additional sessions for the next five months.
They were apparently upset that Israel had rejected their request that a special commission be set up to investigate disputed water rights in the West Bank arid Gaza Strip.
"The Israelis refused all compromise," spokesman Abu Ala was quoted as saying at a news conference
here.
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Germany denies neo-Nazi numbers
BERLIN — The German government has rejected a claim by an Israeli JQurnalist who infiltrated German neo-Nazi groups that the country's right-wing extremist movement is larger than officially acknowledged. by the authorities.
After six months of inves- ., tigation, Yaron, Svoray held a news conference in New York recently in which he challenged the official German estimates and also said he witnessed open sympathy by German police toward neo-Nazis.