Ohio Jewish Chronicle, 1986-01-02

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VOL.64   NO.l
JANUARY 2,1986-TEVET21
Devoted to American
and Jewish (deals.
Barbie Trial Postponed
Senate Conservatives Try To Prevent
Ratification Of Genocide Convention
PARIS (JTA) — The Supreme Court has postponed the trial
of Nazi war criminal Klaus Barbie which had been scheduled
to open Feb. 3. France's highest court announced Dec. 20 the
postponement of the trial after it overturned a lower court decision and after it ruled that the 73-year-old former Gestapo
officer could be charged with crimes against French resistance fighters as well as crimes against Jewish civilians who
he ordered deported to death camps. Legal-experts said that
the trial could begin next March or April, at the earliest,
after the'upcoming legislative elections.
Charges Dismissed Against Demonstrators
NEW YORK (WNS) - New York Criminal Court Justice
Richard Lowe dismissed "disorderly conduct" charges on
Dec. 23 against 24 persons arrested Nov. 19 for staging a sit-in
on the street in front of the Soviet Mission to the UN here. The
sit-in, to protest on behalf of Prisoners of Conscience and refuseniks in the USSR, coincided with the hour of the Geneva
summit meeting between President Reagan and Soviet
leader Mikhail Gorbachev. The defendants included eight
rabbis as well as the national coordinator of the Student
Struggle for Soviet Jewry, Glenn- Richter. The rabbis', all
from the New York metropolitan area, were Irving Beigel,
F-*_-ard Feld, Matthen Futterman, Julie Gordon, Matthew
Kamens, Allan Meyerowitz, James Michaels and Robert
Port.
WASHINGTON (JTA) -
Senate Conservatives have
found a new tactic in their effort to try to prevent ratification of the United Nations
Genocide Convention, a
claim that it will not only
harm the United States but
also Israel.
This became clear when
Sens. Jesse Helms (R. N.C.)
and Chic Hecht (R. Nev.)
used this argumant Dec. 5 to
prevent unanimous consent
to bring up Helms' own
amendments to the treaty.
Helms said "there are
Jewish citizens who previously strongly supported
this treaty who now realize
that Israel will be most
likely the first nation to be
victimized by it." _
Helms had made this argument before. But it came as
a surprise when he was sup-
Report That USSR Will Soon Allow
More Jews To Emigrate Is Termed
Disinformation, Hopeful Speculation
NEW YORK (JTA) - A
report that an official of the
Soviet Embassy in Washington told a representative of a
Jewish organization that he
believed Moscow will restore
diplomatic relations with
Israel in February and dramatically increase' the number of Jews allowed to leave
for Israel was greeted with
skepticism and even anger
in some quarters by those
closely associated with the
Soviet Jewry issue.'   *
According to these officials, the report in The New
York Times concerning a
luncheon meeting a few days
ago between an official of the
Simon Wiesenthal Center of
Los Angeles and a low-level
Soviet official was a compendium of Soviet disinformation and hopeful speculation.
In Jerusalem, Israeli Premier Shimon Peres told the
Editor's Committee of the
Daily Press at its annual luncheon last week that he knew
nothing of the reported meeting in Washington. He said
that over the past two or
. three months there had been
undertakings: — which'he did
not describe — by< "responsible" Soviet representatives
in conversations to consider
the question of family reunification.
, Peres said this was "not a
very precise' commitment,',
but it is an interesting one
nevertheless." He said pther
conversations which took
place on a lesser level
seemed designed more for
image betterment than any
practical purpose. The Premier went on to say -that
Israel would object to Moscow playing a role in Mideast peacemaking unless it
reestablished ties with
Israel.'
Meeting Initiated By The
Russians
The meeting between the
Soviet" official, whose
identity was not disclosed,
and the Wiesenthal Center
representative, who the Jewish Telegraphic Agency was
told was Martin Mendelsohn,
the Center's legal'counsel in
Washington, was initiated by
the Soviets. Mendelsohn,
contacted by the JTA, refused to discuss any aspect
of the meeting or Times re- •
port,
Rabbi Marvin Hier,-dean
of the Center, said thq Soviet
official was eager to put
across two specific points.
These were that he "thinks"
there will be full diplomatic
relations between Israel and
the Soviet Union in February,', before the Communist
P^jrty Congress that month,
and that Moscow is going to
allow many more Jews to
leave than are permitted
now.   '
Soviet Jewish-emigration
levels are running < at far >
lower levels' than during
1979, a peak year for emigration when more than 51,000
Jews were allowed to emigrate. The Soviets, according to reports, are seeking an
(CONTINUED ON PAGE 12)
ported by Hecht, who is Jewish, since the Jewish community has long called for
ratification of the Convention which„was signed in 1949
in the wake of the Holocaust.
-.& Difference Of Opinion
Hecht said he asked "top
Jewish attorneys, international attorneys," to analyze
the treaty and "it is their
opinion that the genocide
treaty would not be in the
best interest of the State of
Israel or the United States of
America."
However, Sen. Howard
Metzenbaum (D. Ohio) replied that "the - American
Jewish community believes
that the Genocide Convention should be ratified. The
American Jewish community further believes that on
the whole question of genocide, Jews of other lands,
who suffered more than perhaps- any. other group in the
world, have an impact and a-
concern about the whole
issue of genocide."
The convention failed to
come to the floor for ratification before the Senate adjourned Dec. 21. But Senate
Majority Leader- Robert
Dole (R. Kans.) is on record
as pledging that it will be
ratified.
"We'll do it this year,"
Dole said at the groundbreaking for the U.S. Holo-
Local Leaders Registered For
Young Leadership Conference
Washington, D.C, March ership Cabinet — the spon-
2-4, will be the sight of the soring organization — and
fifth National Young Leader- Columbus Jewish Federa-
ship Conference. "We al- tion's Conference chair-
ready have 41 individuals    woman.
The conference will include expert analysis of foreign and domestic issues by
veteran Washington and
Middle East observers;
briefings by Congressmen
and White House and State
Holly Kastan
registered from Columbus,
who will join '3,000 young
Jewish leaders from around
the country in an exciting
and stimulating experience
offering an opportunity to
learn and effect change,"
said Holly Kastan, a member a)f the National.United'
Jewish Appeal Young Lead-
caust Memorial Museum in
October. Later, in November, in an address to the
General Assembly of the
Council of Jewish Federations, he said if jt could not
be done before the Senate adjourns it would be one of the
first issues in'the new year.
David Brody, Washington
representative of the Ariti- -
Defamation League of B'nai
B'rith,. told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that Dole
recently repeated this
pledge on the Senate floor.
Jesse Helms Becomes
Strong Israel Supporter
Randall Arndt
Department officials;   discussions with Israeli govern-
(CPNTINUED ON PAGE 9)
WASHINGTON (JTA) -
One of the most interesting
developments of 1985 in
Washington was the transformation of Sen. Jesse
Helms (R. N.C.) from someone considered unfriendly to
Israel to a strong supporter
of the Jewish State. In fact,
Helms, like several other
conservative Senators and
many in the Christian Right,
believes Israel should maintain control of the West
Bank.
Helms-explains his new
position in an article in the
upcoming winter issue "of
Policy Review, the quarterly
published by the Heritage
Foundation, the Washington-
based conservative think
tank. Entitled "A Baptist
Deacon Reflects on American Policy Toward Israel,"
Helms notes'that when his
wife, Dorothy, visited Israel
in 1972, at the time he was
first running for the Senate,
she slipped a prayer on a
piece of paper into the
Western Wall that he should
win. He won the election and
the next two.
But more to the point, the
Helms article describes his
first visit to Israel last
spring- at the invitation of
, Sen. Chic Hecht (R. Nev.) to.
join Hecht and his brother,
Marty, in the'dedication of a
new synagogue at the Hebrew University campus on
Mount Scopus in honor of
Hecht's-96-year-old father.
"We decided to follow in'
the footsteps of the patriarchs," starting in Hebron
and. visiting Judaea and
Samaria, Helms recalls.
"This area called the West
Bank is the heart of ancient
Israel, the very land that the
Bible is all about."
Helms goes on to note: "It
is ironic that modern Israel
is crammed along the seashore, where in' biblical
times, the Philistines and
Canaanites lived; while bib-,
lical Israel, the homeland of
the Jews, is the very territory which the U.S. State Department wants the Jews to
leave."
But Helms also argues
that Israel needs the territories for security^ He <
cizes the U.S. position of returning territory for peace
and leaving the West Bank
under Palestinian authority
in association with Jordan.
"There is no piece of paper
sufficiently strong to uphold
"regional arrangements that
do no meet the dictates' of
common sense," he wrote.
"The animosity of the neighboring. Arab countries does
not spring'f rom concern over
the present inhabitants of
the so-called West Bank or
the fact, that Israel exercises
administrative and military
control over that territory.
'The animosity springs from
the fact that Israel proper
exists. Concessions on ihe
West Bank territory would
only whet the appetite of
animosity, not appease it."
Helms sees the strategy of
King Hussein of Jordan in
the current peace process as
aimed at "imposing indefensible boundaries on
Israel."
Thus, Helms neither supports the Administration's
peace process, nor does bethink its efforts to bring
about negotiations is desirable. "It is not enough to say
that Israel would npver
agree willingly to conditions
that would result in its annihilation," he stresses "The
United States might pressure Israel into agreements
that otherwise would not'
have been accepted."
Helms takes his argument
further and notes that as a
result of the Egyptian-Israel
peace (treaty, the U.S. has
doubled its aid to Israel and
tripled aid to Egypt. "The
contributions to these two
countries are a barely disguised attempt to buy jioace
— to repay Israel for the
massive costs of meeting the
Camp David agreement, and
to give Egypt a basis for
standing up to the i&it ot the
Arab world," he argute.
Helms, who has, continually opposed all lon-ign
aid; adds that this hitih level
of support to Israel results in
compromising "the recipient's freedom of act iwi "He
charges that,this "is ju?-.t tha
way that the State Depart-
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