?J^^BULUFFIN - Thursday. July 2,1987-
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GULAG JEWS REACH ISRAik
Israel receives U.^. files namirig 40,00(rQf Nazi crimes
UNITED NATIONS -Israel has received 489 files on Nazi war criminals from the confidential archives of the
? U n ited Nationscontainingthe names of 36,000-40,000 Nazi war criminals ahd their
: collaborators^ The files were handed to Binyamin Netanyahu, Israelis Ambassador to the U.N. "This initial delivery is^ part of the-^ Yad Vashem NETANYAHU
Institute for Holocaust Research in Jerusalem,** Netanyahu told a press conference here.
The files are in addition to 349 files that Israel received and inspected in recent : months. Netanyahu said the latest files contain the names of and information about senior Nazi officials, Gestapo agents, SS officers,, death camp doctors, camp com-
manders and ghetto supervisors.
"The information contained in these files can shed important new light on the personnel, organization and crimes of the Nazi extermination machine," the Israeli envoy said.
He said that six countries that were members of the new defunct U.N. War Crimes Commission support JsraePs demand that the archives be opened to the publiciThey are Australia, Poland, Yugoslavia, Denmark, Greece and the United States. The Israel government will continue its efforts to convince the remain" ing member states to support opening the files, Netanyahu said. "It def^es logical comprehension why these files should continue to be closed, to public inspection," he explained.
: Netanyahu gave the press a sampling of names in the files. Among them is Martin Bor-mann, who was secretary of
^ the Nazi p^ty, Hitler's personal secretary and signer of a protocol on Oct. 2, 1940 which launched - the Final Solution. He was sentenced in absentia to life imprisonment at Nuremberg in 1946. If he is alive^ he would be 87.
Also among the names was Dr. Werner Vest, who represented the Third Reich in Denmark during the war and ordered deportation of thousands of Danish Jews. Most were spirited by the Danes to neutral Sweden. Vest was sentenced to death in Copenhagen in 1946 but was released in August 1951. He was tried again in 1969 but released in 1972 for health reasons. He is still alive.
Another name was Dr. Otto Dreschler, Nazi governor of Riga, Latvia, who ordered; 15,000 Jews deported to death camps in 1941 to make room foratransport of 18,000Jews from^ Vienna,; Hamburg and Prague. His whereabouts are unknown. jta
BBW Photo
MORE ABOUT WOMEN BAT-MITZVAHED — The increasing number of Bat-Mitzvah programs In U.S. synagogues reflects a desire among women of all ages to l>ecome more observant and more connected to synagogue life, so says this month's Issue of Women's IVoff<^ publication of B'nai B'rith Women. Program at Adas Israel Congregation in Washington, D.C. is largest in the country, with more than 100 graduates.
First Jews attenij Arab Assoc. meet
WASHINGTON
The
recent 15th annual policy conference. National Association of Arab Americans (NAAA) for the first time reached out to the Jewish community.
Rep. Benjamin Gilman (R. N.Y.) attended the dinner, and co-hosted a farewell reception for the group along with Rep. Stephen Solarz (D. N.Y.) and their House colleagues of Arab descent ^ Mary Rose Dakar (D. Ohio) and Nick Rahall (D. W.Va.).
NAAA executive director
Poll shows Israelis side with setUers
TEL AVIV — A majority of Israelis poljed-sym-pathize to greater_or lesser degree with the behavior of Jewish settlers in tjse West Bank who have been sharply criticized by the Israel Defense Force for violent actions against the local Arab population — most recently the armed attack on the Daheisha refugee camp last month.
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David Sadd said there was a strong interest expressed by his board to work iwth American Jews. Invitations to the policy meet were sent out to all major Jewish groups, although only a handful attended, including Hyman Bookbinder of the American Jewish Committee and journalist I.F. Stone.
A luncheon on "prospects for peace*V featured a Jewish Israeli, M.K. Col. Ran Cohen (Citizen's Rights party). Israeli Arabswere represented by a moderate — M.K. Abdulwahab Darawshe (Labor party). There was a deliberate absence of PLO speakers on the agenda.
But NAAA unequivocally endorses the PLO as the representative of the Palestinian people, and PLO information office head Hasan Rahman addressed the group briefly.
Award Hal Linden
NEW YORK - Actor Hal Linden received the Distinguished Achievement Award from Writers and Artists for Peace in the Middle East. - ^
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Lifton book on Nazi Dr.s wins lop NJB award
NEW YORK — The Jewish Welfare Board has announced the winners of the 38th annual National Jewish Book Awards: Holocaust — Robert Lifton, Nazi Doctors: Medical Killing and the Psychology of Genocide (Basic Books); Jewish though — Arnold Eisen, Gulut: Modern Jewish Reflection on Homelessness and Homecoming (Indiana University); Israel - Samuel Heilman, A Walker in Jerusalem (Summit Books); Jewish history — David Biale, Power and Powe^lessness. in Jewish History (Schocken Books); scholarship — Reuven Hammer, iSi/re: /I Tannaitic Commentary on the Book of Deuteronomy (Yale University Press); child ren*slitefa-^ ture Eileen Bluestone S\i<&Txmn^ Monday in Odessa (Jewish Publication Society; and illustrated child renV books — Myra Livingston, author, and Lloyd Bloom, illustrator. Poems for Jewish Holidays (Holiday House). No award was given this year for fiction. jta
NADEZHDA FRADKOVA (right), who arrived in Israel, is the first woman Prisoner of Zion to immigrate from the USSR in many years, Israeli newspapers noted. She spent the years 1984-86 in a L^bor camp. Another new arrivai the same day from the Soviet Union was Grigory Geishis (left), also a Prisoner of Zicn, who spent two years in the "Gulag" for "avoiding army service."
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NEW YORK — American " Jewish Congress .has announced withdrawal of its sponsorship of a meeting American Jewish leaders had scheduled Sept.. 11 during Pope John Paul II's planned visit in Miami. The action protested last week's audience at the Vatican between the Pope and President Kurt Waldheim of Austria.
Jews round the world expressed shock and outrage following announcement of the papal meeting, urging the Pope to reconsider.
Six other North American Jewish organizations also released a statement asserting that the scheduled September meeting in Miami has become ■*an inappropriate forum to d i sq u ss' u rge n t i s s ue s o f Catholic-Jewish relations.*'
The statement was signed by the Synagogue Council of America; the Anti-Defamation League of B'nai B'rith; the American Jewish -Committee; the World Jewish Congress; B'nai B'rith; and the National Jewish Community Relations Advisory Council. In a separate statement, R^uthPopkin, president of Hadassah, had called on the Pope to cancel the audience.
Other protests were regis^
tered by the American Jewish ~ Committee, Jewish War Veter rans and Conference of Presidents of major American Jewish organizations.
Seymour Reich, president of B'nai B'rith International, suggested that John Cardinal O'Connor, the Archbishop of New York, urge the Pope to cancel.
In Montreal, the Canadian Jewish Congress had expressed dismay that the Pope will see Waldheinr "when most world leaders have seen fit to place him in virtual diplomatic isolation," CJC president Dorothy Reitman said', "We find it beyond understanding that his first official visit will be to the Vatican."
- American Jewish activists who demonstrated in Rome during the Waldheim visit included Rabbi Avi Weiss of New York and his group of the "Coalition of Concern." They wore the uniforms of concentration camp inmates and had planned to be wherever Waldheim would go that they would be permitted, "inside or outside the Vati-
can.
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Honor Sakharovs
NEW YORK — RefusenikL Yelena Bonner and her dissident scientist husband Andrei Sakharov received honorary degrees in absentia from The College of Staten Island of the City University of New York.
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10 Dutch shuls join
AMSTERDAM — At least 10 small Ashkenazic congregations will be absorbed by larger ones in their vicinity, according to a decision by central committee of Netherlands Ashkenazic congregations. The decision applies to 10 of 40 shuls, those with fewer-than 25 members, no longer able to provide them^ selves withrequired facilities.
IDF reservists counter each other after Daheisha
TEL AVIV — A group of Israel Defense Force reservists serving in the West Bank has been recruited by/Gush Emunim and its allies in Likud and other rightwing parties.
These reservists will wage a propaganda counter-offensive against IDF soldiers and officers who have criticized Jewish settlers for violent and provocaTfvf acts against Arab residents of the territory, par-Trial postponed
- TEL AVIV — The three-judge panel trying John Dem-janjuk granted the suspected Nazi war criminal a one-month postponement to Feb; 15 at the request of his American attorney, Mark O'Connor, to allow him additional time to study prosecution documents. jta
ticularly the armed attack on the Daheisha refugee camp near Bethlehem last month. No serious injuries had occurred.
About 30 reservists have signed a statement protesting "a situation in which senior echelons and the media cast all the blame on the Jewish residents of the area while they are constantly being murdered-and attacked by Arab rioters."
The petition counters another group of reservists posted in Hebron, who issued a statement charging Jewish settlers there with constant harassment of Arab residents, and also at critics of the Daheisha raid. Lt. Gen. Amram Mitzna, commander of central sector, had denounced the Daheisha raid as "contemptible." jta
Soviets to visit
JERUSALEM
Israel
'has issued visas to members of a Soviet consular delegation; due in Israel this month, t hrough the Dutch ■ Embassy in Moscow representing Jsraeli interests in USSR. The delegation, the first official Soviet body to visit Israel
-since Moscow broke diplomatic relations after 1967 Six-Day War, will be headed by deputy director, Soviet foreign ministry!s consular department, Evgeni Antipov.
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SIlin Bet testifies
TEL AVIV — An agent of the Shin Bet, Israel's iiitemal security service, testified in closed court that several Israelis have with government approval met with PLO officials. The agent, identified only as "Reuven," appeared as expert witness at trial in Ramla magistrates court of four Israeli leftists who met with PLO in Rumania several months ago in violation of the law. "Reuven" named Lova _ Eliav and Uri Avneri. jta ' .'*■■, ■■.■*■. .*
'Retain contact'
TEL AVIV —A poll taken last month showed 78 percent of Israelis believe Israel should maintain some degree of military or commercial ties with South Africa regardless of the embargoes imposed by the UiS. and Western European countries. jta
Barbie verdict expecteil July 3
LYON — The verdict in the trial of Nazi war criminal Klaus Barbie is expected July 3, and. legal experts here believe the jury will take no more than two hours to reach a decision. jta
Swiss oust Nazi
GENEVA — Ernst Kim, a self-proclaimed Nazi who expressed racist views in an interview with a West German newspaper, was ousted from his seat on Bern City Council and from the extreme rightwing National Action Party which he represented. jta
Too early' for tall(s
UNITED NATIONS —
U.N. Secretary General Javier Perez de Cuellar has said at present there is not sufficient agreement between the parties to the Middle East conflict to permit the convening of an international conference for peace. jta
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Hate loses election
PHOENIX — An Arizona State University sophomore whose campaign signs were defaced with swastikas, dirtied and stolen, has been
elected to the student senate last month. jta