Letters
LETTERS Zionist Congress To the Editor: A few correctives are in order for Judea Miller's otherwise accurate description of the 20th World Zionist Congress. (July-August) (1) The Association of...
...Rabbi Roland B. Gittelsohn National Chairman, ARZA Boston, Massachusetts Cuba To the Editor: In the article on the Jews of Cuba, (July-August) no reference was made to the Jews living in Guanta-namo Bay and the active religious program being carried on there by American Jewish personnel connected with the U.S...
...The unfortunate fact is that to date no major political party in Israel (with the possible exception of the Liberals) has endorsed the kind of religious pluralism which ARZA so successfully stimulated the World Zionist Congress to support...
...If this fear is justified, it must be taken very seriously...
...5) ARZA did not support a resolution calling "for recognition of Palestinian national rights...
...I haven't the faintest idea where or how Rabbi Miller got that impression...
...Navy...
...They can say anything they want to against us: they have no fear of making us angry, or of roiling up the Cold War...
...Whether Labor will retain its current favorable attitude toward non-Orthodox Judaism in Israel when and if it recaptures control of the government remains to be seen...
...The Jewish community celebrated the Passover holidays with two seders and some seventy in attendance...
...But is it justified...
...In all instances where we voted as did Labor, this was on issues where we happened to agree with the Labor position and would have voted the same way even had we not benefited by receiving two of their delegates...
...That stipulation was included in a resolution passed by the second World Zionist Congress in 1898...
...Two delegates came from Labor, two—both Reform rabbis—from other factions...
...He was, in fact, a delegate of the ZOA...
...The possibility that Russia would start such a war is equally remote...
...Moreover, a dictatorship is inherently fearful of its people, otherwise why keep them in political straitjackets...
...He was voted to power...
...2) The constitution of the World Zionist Organization does not "stipulate that religious issues cannot be raised in the Congress...
...A government which is in constant dread of defections and keeps her people virtually imprisoned, is hardly likely to send mass armies out to do battle for it...
...The agreement signed in Jerusalem by Yigal Allon and myself created no ties which in any way could interfere with our delegates' freedom of conscience...
...John J. Rosenblatt Jewish Chaplain Norfolk, Virginia Soviet Brute To the Editor: Your editorial, "The Soviet Brute" (July/August) calls for prolonged applause...
...He is obviously entitled to agree or disagree with our views or even our existence...
...July-August) (1) The Association of Reform Zionists of America (ARZA) does not reflect "a growing disillusionment among Reform and Conservative Jews...
...A resolution passed by one Congress can be amended or reversed by ensuing Congresses...
...Her foreign policy is quite likely motivated mainly by the fear that she doesn't stand a chance against us (plus NATO), especially if we keep ourselves militarily strong...
...Most of Germany was with him...
...The fear" is thus a myth, which the friends of the USSR like to nurture among us...
...6) You have already received a letter from Judea Miller correcting your identification of him as an ARZA delegate at the Congress...
...The resolution of 80 years ago, not incidentally, has already been rendered null and void through creation by the WZO of a Department of Torah Education...
...William Stern New York, New York...
...As we allow it to obsess us, and we repeat it by rote, we find ourselves pouncing on a Pat Moynihan in the UN for telling the USSR what they should be told...
...endangering the fragile detente we have achieved...
...There is no post-Congress tie between ARZA and any other Zionist faction...
...That will be the best way for us to gain respect, allies, and strength, and that will be the best insurance against the much feared "nuclear holocaust...
...No, no, you are right, but please, please don't make them angry...
...No analogy to Hitler...
...As you say, "We do not want tension and hostility...
...It is worth a moment to dwell upon this fear...
...4) It is curiously inconsistent to claim simultaneously that ARZA arose out of disillusionment with Labor and that ARZA was (by implication, insidiously) tied to Labor at the Congress...
...The only time Russia committed its troops was in mortal self-defense against Hitler, and also in the few instances of a show of strength in Poland, Hungary, and Czechoslovakia, when small detachments picked, no doubt, for particular ideological impervious-ness, were enough to do the job...
...The fear is...
...It implies, but does not quite state, that to say all the things we should say about Russian totalitarianism, its contempt for human rights, and its undisguised acts of (anti-detente) aggression and intimidation in many parts of the world, and quite possibly a nuclear war...
...It is time that such poppycock give way to a realistic contention on the world scene with such dangers as Russia and its satellites (don't forget Cuba) do represent, and the necessity to fight militantly, using all peaceful means, for human rights for all people...
...with the policies of Labor...
...Why such sentiments are rarely expressed in America is difficult to understand—except when you are aware of the inhibition against "the Cold War...
...I am most proud of the desire shown by the young Jewish members of the Gitmo community to establish their identity on these communist shores...
...It does reflect impatience with the entire political leadership of Israel...
...The United States would certainly not be launching such a war, although those who like to feed our fear may say, "What makes you so sure...
...3) The Labor party did not give the ARZA three of its delegates so that we might qualify as an independent faction...
...They are now building a Jewish program under the direction of Navy Operations Specialist Howard B. Schero with the assistance of my office in Norfolk, Virginia...
...Go to the Berlin Wall and see the extremes to which communists go to keep their people from racing to freedom...
...He is not entitled to distort the facts in order to support his position...
Vol. 3 • October 1978 • No. 10
