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February 5, 1998

Up Front

Leave a Comment / Entertainment, Old Stories, Up Front /

Cast members from “The TenthMan.”

A woman in a fancy hat approaches Bert Dragin at Spago. She wantsto know if he is an actor, someone from “Dallas” or “Falcon Crest.”

Actually, the distinguished, sixtyish Dragin is not an actor; he’sa film producer who sold his Cleveland-based furniture business andmoved out here to get into the movies in 1981. But he is “doinglunch” at Spago to talk about his latest, very non-Hollywood project:directing Paddy Chayefsky’s “The Tenth Man” at the West Valley JewishCommunity Center.

Bronx-born Chayefsky, author of the Oscar-winning screenplays for”Marty,” “Network” and “The Hospital,” often wrote about hisfirsthand knowledge of the lives of American Jews. His 1959comedy-drama, “The Tenth Man,” which recalls the legend of “TheDybbuk,” takes place in a run-down, dwindling Long Island synagogue,where the elderly members gather each morning to pray, although theyare constantly searching for a 10th man to make a minyan. Thus, theyensnare Arthur Brooks, a young man in the midst of existentialcrisis, a role Dragin twice performed when he was doing theater at aCleveland JCC in the 1960s and 1970s.

Dragin, between bites of a cobb salad, says that he actually spoketo the playwright before he first played Brooks in 1967. “A friend ofmine grew up in the same tenement with Chayefsky,” he says. “She gaveme his telephone number and said, ‘Just tell him Mrs. Glucken said tocall.'”

Dragin, then a young man, had never before spoken to a famousauthor. But by the end of the half-hour conversation, Chayefsky hadhelped him understand his tortured character as “a man who believesin nothing.”

Today, Dragin insists that while the play is four decades old,”the themes of assimilation and the conflict between Orthodox andnon-Orthodox Jews still resonate,” he says.

For tickets and information about the shows, Feb. 7, 8, 14 and15, call (818) 587-3300.

Chekhov and Checks to UJF

Last November, émigré Milena Albert was struck by anad that ran in The Jewish Journal about poor, elderly Jews back inher native Russia. So the director, who emigrated in 1989, promptlytelephoned the United Jewish Fund of The Jewish Federation: Shewanted to donate 5 percent of the profits from her production ofChekhov’s “The Seagull,” which is currently playing at the HollywoodCourt Theatre, to help.

It’s no ordinary production of the classic, says Albert, who haswanted to stage “The Seagull,” the tale of a doomed writer, sinceseeing it at the Moscow Art Theatre as a girl. The Los Angelesproduction will feature Albert’s new translation of Chekhov’soriginal 1895 manuscript, the one that existed before czarist censorstampered with the play.

Albert came across the nine pages of censored dialogue in variousfootnotes and appendixes while working on her own translation, whichshe began “after reading seven English versions that weren’t true tothe “Russian spirit” of “The Seagull.” The censors apparentlyrequired Chekhov to tone down risqué elements in the play,among other changes, because the notion of extramarital affairsoffended their prudish sensibilities, Albert says. Chekhov was so fedup with the censors that he let a friend handle the matter after nineexasperating months.

The missing dialogue rounds out the supporting characters, so “theplay is much more an ensemble piece,” says Albert, who is putting up$9,000 of her own money to mount the play.

“The Seagull” runs through Feb. 15. For tickets, call (888)566-TIXX.

A scene from”The Seagull.”

all about brecht

 

Above, Bertolt Brecht. Below, David Catanzarite, artisticdirector of the Brecht centennial celebration.

 

When director-performance artist David Catanzarite was 8 yearsold, his mother, a Holocaust survivor, told him how her parents dugtheir own graves at Berdichev and were shot into mass pits. All thetown’s Jews perished that day, but the young woman survived the warby posing as a Christian.

The tale madean impression on Catanzarite, who, all his life, has been preoccupiedwith the stories of survivors, of people who endure. The obsessionled him to work in the political theater, conducting workshops withblacks from the townships of South Africa and performing inCzechoslovakia on the eve of the Velvet Revolution.

Of late, it has motivated him to plan an ambitious West Coastcentennial festival that honors Bertolt Brecht, perhaps the greatestpolitical playwright of the century.

Brecht, of course, was a Marxist who spurned romantic andexpressionist trends and experimented with new forms. He called hiswork “epic theater”: Often his characters directly address theaudience, commenting on the action, so that they “are in the streamand yet above it,” Brecht has said.

“The Threepenny Opera,” with music by Kurt Weill, was a hit in NewYork in mid-century, and the writer himself was a central figure inthe German exile community of Los Angeles, to where he fled from theNazis.

Since the 1960s, when social criticism was chic, however, somehave deplored Brecht’s work as didactic, Marxist grandstanding. Andthe playwright, who promoted himself as a communist martyr, wasexposed as less-than-heroic. Author John Fuegi, for example, stirredcontroversy by charging that the writer stole from his womencollaborators; at one point, Fuegi charges, Brecht’s wife, mistressand ex-lover lived unhappily under one roof.

Nevertheless, “The Threepenny Opera” remains a classic, and Brechtis still considered one of the most famous German authors of thecentury.

One can learn more about the man and the artist during thefestival, which runs Feb. 5 to 10, with two dozen free events thatwill include music, cabaret and a Brecht-a-thon — a reading of fiveplays, from “Mother Courage” to “The Caucasian Chalk Circle,” at theMidnight Special Bookstore.

At Villa Aurora in Pacific Palisades, where Brecht was a frequentguest in the 1940s, professional actors will read “Edward II.”

There will be a Caribbean-Creole version of “The Caucasian ChalkCircle”; a translation of “Baal,” influenced by the beat poets; and aJapanese American actress will play “The Jewish Wife,” a vignettefrom “The Private Life of the Master Race.”

“I sought the broadest possible range of directors andtranslations, to see how many ways we can make Brecht happen,” saysCatanzarite, who also heads the directing program at Pomona College.

If “Mother Courage” and “The Good Person of Setzuan” are survivorsof sorts, so was Brecht. He found himself near the top of the Nazienemies list; he fled with his Jewish wife across Europe and finallyto Santa Monica, where he was appalled by the status of “art ascommodity” in Hollywood, Catanzarite says. He was dissatisfied by hismodest success in the film business. By 1947, he had had enough ofAmerica.

Brecht was summoned to testify about his ties to communist circlesbefore the House Un-American Activities Committee; he appeared at thehearing with airline tickets in his pocket and left the country forgood the next day. Excerpts from his taped testimony will be playedat the “Brecht-on-Brecht” reading on Feb. 10; apparently, Brecht gotthe better of his interviewers by playing the fool. Some time later,he remarked that his interrogators were better than the Nazis: “TheNazis wouldn’t have let me smoke,” he quipped.

For more festival information and a schedule of events, call(909) 607-4385.

Up Front Read More »

Torah Portion

Leave a Comment / Old Stories /

Here’s a story that will sadden andamaze you. It’s Jean Dominique Bauby’s story. In 1995, he was theeditor-in-chief of Elle magazine in France, the father of two youngchildren, a 43-year-old man known and loved for his wit, his styleand his passion for life. Until he suffered a rare form of strokethat left him with something called “locked-in syndrome,” a conditionin which the patient is paralyzed from head to toe, with his mindcompletely intact — imprisoned in his own body, unable tospeak or move.

In Bauby’s case, there was one tiny exception tohis being “locked-in.” He could blink his left eyelid. So, by havingan assistant point to one letter at a time as he blinked yes or no,Bauby wrote a book called “The Diving Bell and The Butterfly”; it’s abook about being locked in.

“Bath time: My weekly sponge bath plunges me intodistress — nostalgic for the immersions that were the joy ofmy previous life. Armed with a cup of tea or a Scotch, a good book ora pile of newspapers, I would soak for hours, maneuvering the tapswith my toes. Rarely do I feel my condition so cruelly as when I amrecalling such pleasures.

“Meal time: By means of a tube threaded into mystomach, two or three bags of a brownish fluid provide my dailycaloric needs. For pleasure, I imagine a simple, soft-boiled egg withfingers of toast and lightly salted butter. The yolk flows warmlyover my tongue and down my throat. Oh, to taste the hard sausagetrussed in netting, suspended permanently from the ceiling of mymind.

“Father’s Day: Today is Father’s Day. Until mystroke, we had felt no need to fit this made-up holiday into ouremotional calendar. But today we spend the whole of it together,affirming that even a rough sketch, a shadow, a tiny fragment of adad, is still a dad. I am torn between joy at seeing them living,moving, laughing for a few hours, and fear that the sight of all thissuffering is not ideal entertainment for a boy of 10 and his8-year-old sister.

“Grief surges over me. His face not two feet frommine, my son, Theophile, sits patiently, waiting — and I, hisfather, have lost the simple right to ruffle his bristly hair, clasphis downy neck, hug his small, lithe, warm body tight against me.There are no words to express it. My condition is monstrous.Suddenly, I can take no more. Tears well and my throat emits a hoarserattle that startles Theophile. ‘Don’t be scared, little man. I loveyou.'”

This week, the Torah reminds of something thatBauby knew all too well. Although God provides manna each morning inthe desert so that the people can gather and bake it into cakes thattaste “like sweet cream,” the manna can’t be stored overnight. Ifwhatever fell wasn’t eaten that day, as the Torah not-so-gentlystates, “it became infested with maggots and it stank.” Manna isreally a lesson to teach us that certain things cannot be deferred,or stored up for later use — certain things, like life.

What Bauby longs for is what most of us take forgranted — each day’s manna; an escape from the prison ofapathy; an invitation to find meaning, have some fun, sink into thesimple pleasure of a soak in the tub, of good bread and wine,Shabbat, Torah and prayer, of keeping our children and each otherwarm with our arms, our kisses and our souls. We either savor thesweetness of each day, or it spoils. It’s pretty simple really— life, like manna, doesn’t keep.

Steven Z. Leder is a rabbi at Wilshire Boulevard Temple.

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Israel Won’t Remain

Leave a Comment / Old Stories /

Seven years ago, when Saddam Husseinhurled 39 Scud missiles at Tel Aviv, Israel reluctantly refrainedfrom retaliating. The Bush administration convinced Prime MinisterYitzhak Shamir that an Israeli blow at Iraq would undermine theanti-Baghdad coalition assembled for Operation Desert Storm.

The Iraqi dictator would be foolish to assume thatIsrael would again sit on its hands if it were attacked.

Israelis were stung by a Jan. 26 statement by thechief United Nations weapons inspector, Richard Butler, who said thatSaddam Hussein possessed enough biological weapons “to blow away TelAviv.” Lines began to form at gas mask distribution centers. On oneday alone, 12,000 applied to upgrade their equipment. Commentatorsadvised householders to prepare a sealed room, as they did in 1991,though there seems to have been no rush on masking tape or combatrations.

A Gallup Poll published last weekend found 86percent of Israelis favoring military retaliation. The London Timesreported that the Jewish state would respond to an unconventionalattack by dropping a neutron bomb on Baghdad.

No Israeli spokesman has made so explicit athreat, but Saddam knows that Israel has a nuclear capability. Hecannot ignore the possibility that it would be used if he resorts tochemical or biological weapons. That may indeed have been whatdeterred him last time, when he stuck to conventional warheads forhis strikes on Israel and Saudi Arabia.

Unlike 1991, the United States does not nowcommand the support of Egypt, Saudi Arabia and other Arab states forits anti-Saddam crusade. There is no regional coalition for Israel toundermine. Washington would have to marshal other arguments topersuade Shamir’s right-wing Likud successor, Binyamin Netanyahu, tohold back. It might not succeed this time.

So far, however, the word in Jerusalem is “watchand wait.” The Gulf confrontation quickly replaced Bill Clinton’ssexual adventures at the top of Israeli front pages, but there is nopanic, not yet anyway. Ron Ben-Ishai, a leading military commentator,urged Israelis to “prepare quietly for any possibility, but withoutshowing fear and without issuing declarations which could possiblyplant ideas in the mind of the Butcher of Baghdad.”

In that spirit, the government decreed that onlyNetanyahu and Defense Minister Yitzhak Mordechai would make officialstatements on the crisis. With American assistance, Israel isboosting its stock of antidotes. The professional assessment is thatan Iraqi attack is not imminent. With the partial success of theallies’ massive 1991 bombardment and the U.N. inspection program,intelligence sources estimate that Saddam is reduced to two or threemissile launchers and a few dozen Scuds. He is also reported to havehidden about 75 nonconventional warheads.

There is no evidence that they have been deployedin western Iraq, ready to target Israel, which still has no effectiveanti-missile shield. But just in case, a special hot line has beenactivated between the Pentagon in Washington and the Defense Ministryin Tel Aviv. No one is underrating Saddam’s lethal potential.

His son-in-law, Hussein Kamel, who defected toJordan in August 1995, revealed that vast stocks of deadly agentswere still concealed in Iraq. Hussein Kamel knew what he was talkingabout. He was the man who oversaw Iraq’s nonconventional-weaponsprogram (he was murdered after rashly returning to Baghdad).

Since 1995, Iraq has acknowledged producing 2,265gallons of the germ-warfare agent anthrax; huge quantities of thefast-acting toxin, ricin, described by U.S. Defense Secretary WilliamCohen as “one of the most deadly poisons on earth” and to which thereis no antidote; and 3.9 tons of the chemical nerve agent VX, of whichone-hundredth of a gram is said to be fatal.

Western analysts are not convinced by Saddam’sclaim to have destroyed these murderous stocks. Even if it had, Iraqstill has the facilities to manufacture more VX in a plant ostensiblybuilt to produce pesticides. Experts say that the technology isidentical. Ricin is extracted from the castor bean, and the Americansbelieve that Iraq has hundreds of acres of castor beans undercultivation.

The question in 1998 is not whether Saddam’s Scudscould deliver these lethal injections, but how much damage they arecapable of inflicting. A lot depends on whether his scientists haveworked out how to detonate chemical or biological warheads in midairover populated areas. The answer to that is not known.

“If a warhead detonated on impact as the missilehit the ground, it would not cause extensive damage,” Laurie Mylroie,of the Foreign Policy Research Institute in Philadelphia, explainedin the December issue of the Middle East Review of InternationalAffairs. “A midair burst is necessary to achieve the dissemination ofan unconventional agent that would kill most human beings nearby.Still, if even one Iraqi missile with a biological warhead were toexplode as intended over a Middle East city, it would mean theannihilation of an unprotected population.”

Israel, its leaders insist, reserves the right todecide for itself how to protect its population. Netanyahu told aconference of Orthodox rabbis that the situation was being monitored”thoroughly on a day-to-day basis, with deployment happeningaccordingly.”

Let’s hope that Saddam Hussein is listening.

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The Exoneration of

Leave a Comment / Old Stories /

 

The Exoneration of

Elia Kazan

When I was growing up in New York in the 1950s, theliberal-leftist microcosm that was my world had one unmitigatedvillain: Elia Kazan. It didn’t matter that he was the miraculousmidwife who had brought Arthur Miller’s “Death of a Salesman” andTennessee Williams’ “Streetcar Named Desire” to fruition; he was a”squealer,” a “rat” and a Judas who had turned in his communistcomrades, and, therefore, deserved to be hung, drawn and quartered.

The animus against Kazan began shortly after he became acooperative witness before the House Un-American ActivitiesCommittee, and it has not abated in 40 years. Shortly after learningof his testimony, Arthur Miller came out with a play (“The Crucible”)about an accused man who refused to “name names.” Originallyearmarked for Kazan, Miller publicly broke with the man who hadvirtually established his career, and the play was directed by JedHarris. Some years later, a reconciliation of sorts occurred, andKazan did direct Miller’s “After the Fall” at New York’s LincolnCenter, but, by then, the gleam of notoriety had somewhat faded onboth men.

After condemnation from the left, Kazan’s career went on, if notimperturbably, at least steadfastly. There were movies such as “Onthe Waterfront,” “East of Eden,” “A Face in the Crowd,” “The LastTycoon” and a number of novels of which “The Arrangement” wasprobably the most successful. But, by and large, Kazan was treatedlike a spent force — which, in fact, was the last thing he actuallywas.

His massive autobiography could not redeem him, because it did notcontain enough mea culpa to satisfy the liberal left. The fact is,Kazan’s disaffiliation with American-styled Soviet communism wasactually a genuine disenchantment with a treacherous, mean-spiritedand obnoxious political philosophy to which too many impressionableliberals had been drawn in the 1930s and 1940s. But, of course, itwasn’t the ideology that was at issue. The more salient point wasthat people who were “named” were economically ruined and so theostensibly honorable ritual of repudiating communist doctrine carriedwith it the stigma of destroying the lives of former friends andcomrades.

Last October, the four major talent guilds produced acommemorative evening for survivors of the blacklist at the Academyof Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. It was a heartwarming eveningand just about four decades overdue. Obviously, the homage paid tothe victims of the hearings that blighted so many lives did not, andcould not, extend to those who, like Kazan, had been partiallyresponsible for the creation of the blacklist. I, like so many of mymorally indignant friends, smoldered with resentment against Kazanthrough the 1960s and 1970s, but I must confess that gradually, bymeans of a painful and torturous circumlocution, I have reached a newplateau of understanding about both the man and his times.

I feel now that what is significant about Kazan, and whatposterity will honor him for, is his creative genius, and that isright and proper. To amend Marc Antony’s line: The good that men dolives after them. It is the evil that is “oft interred in theirbones.”

Kazan wasn’t simply “a brilliant director”; he was an artist wholeft his stamp on a generation of other artists, and he was the manwho raised social and psychological realism to a plane where it hadnever been before. He was a sorcerer in that he conjured magicalperformances out of performers such as Brando, Dean, Steiger, Harris,et al., which these artists rarely achieved again. He did it byrefusing to play the role of old-styled-director in jodhpurs andboots, bellowing abuse at trembling actors, and, rather, by quietlywhispering hints and provocations into their ears, which radicallytransformed their sense of characterization and remarkably enhancedthe material on which they were working. No ploy was too low or tooconniving not to be employed to win the “gold” of a spectacularperformance. No tactic too shoddy or too cruel if it jolted theimagination, thereby astonishing both the audience and the artist.

In retrospect, it could be argued that his influence onplaywrights such as Miller, Williams and Inge is even greater thanthat stamped upon his actors. Tennessee Williams acknowledged hisdebt to him openly, and, before the split, Miller did so privately.Kazan was the shaman and silent manipulator who simultaneouslywinnowed out and sharpened the work of America’s finest playwrights,turning torturous “rewrites” into startling “mise en scène.”We are all, in a sense, living in the Age of Kazan, and our idolatryof artists such as Brando and Dean, Malden and Steiger, Miller andWilliams is in no small measure due to the directorial intelligencethat colored the public images of those highly esteemed actors andplaywrights.

In justifying his decision “to testify” rather than “take theFifth,” Kazan, plumbing the moral circuitry that separates the”informer” from the “silent accomplice,” fashioned a cinematicmasterpiece in “On The Waterfront,” scripted by that other “friendlywitness,” Budd Schulberg. That film was torn from the guts of a manin a state of agonizing ambivalence. Can one really argue, 40 yearsafter the fact, that the moral dilemma painfully exorcised in thatwork was not worth the effort? Regarding his testimony, Kazan hasnever expressed any public remorse, and it may simply be myintrojection that tends to believe he felt it in private. But shouldour appreciation of an artist’s achievement mainly be determined bythe flaws in his character? By that measure, we would have toderogate Brecht, Ibsen, Strindberg, Celine, Von Karajan and dozens ofothers.

Every year, doting prize-givers commemorate those artists who haveenriched their profession. Even poor, abused Chaplin, spurned by hisadopted country and branded as everything from a lecher to a Red, wasrehabilitated before his peers, as he sobbed in his wheelchair whenhe received a special Oscar, which was due him at least 30 yearsbefore.

It is bad enough that prophets are never honored in their owncountry, but a truly dismal spectacle to see mediocrities regularlylauded in one hyped-up award ceremony after another, while supremeartists languish in neglect.

Surely, it is time to honor Elia Kazan’s unsurpassed mastery –not his moral character or his self-justifying sense of ethics, butthe potent imagination with which he fertilized some of America’smost treasured playwrights and inspired many of its greatestperformers. If Russia can rehabilitate non-persons such as Meyerholdand Solzhenitsyn, surely America can acknowledge the troubled andbesieged man who provided both theater and film with some of its mostenduring achievements.

Charles Marowitz, a regular contributor for In

Theater magazine, writes from Malibu.

All rights reserved by author

The Exoneration of Read More »

A Woman’s Voice

Leave a Comment / Old Stories, Womans Voice /

Stop the presses: The Jewish communityis ready to discover…singles. That’s right. What intermarriage and”continuity” were to the 1990s, singles will be in the years ahead: agroup to study, court, serve and, finally, value.

Why are we discovering singles just now? Thearrival of singles is foretold in a soon-to-be-released populationsurvey of Jewish Los Angeles, which shows that 38 percent of Jewsover age 18 are currently unmarried. Moreover, that singlespopulation is lodged squarely in both the baby boomer group andGen-X. The numbers break down by age as follows:

Ages 18 to 29: 33 percent (of all thosesingle)

Ages 30 to 59: 39 percent

Ages 60 and up: 28 percent

There’s really no surprise in this, especially ifyou read single ads or sit in on chat rooms. In fact, the Los Angelessurvey generally repeats figures first seen in the 1990 NationalJewish Population Survey. Apparently, no one read them in thehysteria over intermarriage. Until now, the part of the singles worldthat got attention was the frail, elderly grandma or grandpa wholived alone and needed Meals on Wheels.

But better late than never. Today, the passion isfor singles, and I say it’s good news, indeed.

“They’re a silent segment of the Jewishcommunity,” Sandra King, director of Jewish Family Service in LosAngeles, said of singles. “They’ve gotten lost in the hierarchy ofneeds. Now, attention must be paid.” Pini Herman, researchcoordinator of the Federation’s Planning and Allocations Department,which oversaw the study, calls these singles the “bellwether” of theJewish future.

What does it mean to pay attention to singles?That is ticklish. Jewish singles, professionally competent and oftenwell-educated, learn quickly to fend for themselves. They are used tocreating what sociologists call “compensatory systems” — supportgroups of their own to celebrate holidays or help with childcare.

But Sally Weber, director of Jewish communityoutreach programs for Jewish Family Service, tells me that whilesingles don’t organize or complain to the powers that be, their needsare great. (On Sunday, Feb. 15, Weber and I will participate in adaylong program, “Creating Family Life as a Single Parent,” at theWestside Jewish Community Center, sponsored by JFS’s new JewishSingle Parent Network. For information, call [213] 761-8800.)

“They feel isolated, spiritually and personally.You’re supposed to know how to be an adult, to raise your own kids,find your own friends, your own dates,” she says. “Singles are nothappy about asking for advice.” So get ready for a lot of singlessupport groups, for grants and symposia and commissions. I’m surewe’ll learn a lot.

But singles are, by nature, suspicious; they’vehad one too many bad dates and one too many unreturned phone calls.They’ve gone to networking parties where the testosterone level isabout -3. They know a line when they’ve heard one. And they’ll besuspicious of being discovered only just now, when fund raising inother parts of the community is drying up.

Can they be reached? My guess is that singles willput cynicism aside if, and it’s a big if, our community offers themsomething they can’t get anywhere else.

What will that be? Over the last few years,synagogues and community organizations have tried to become more opento singles. Synagogue rituals are no longer strictly reserved forcouples. There are singles havurot, and a small but growing “men’sclub” revival. The old institutional bias against the unmarried isfading, if not gone.

So there’s only one service the Jewish communityalone can provide to singles: a dating service. I’ll know the Jewishcommunity is committed to serving the needs of single Jews when itfunds a full-time matchmaker and does personalized matchmaking on alow-fee basis.

A shadchan: Am I serious? Totally. Until now, ourcommunity has generally left the singles market to privateenterprise. If you’re not the kind who responds to young leadershipprograms, then you’re left to seek out personal ads, GreatExpectations, a private matchmaker, Aish HaTorah. This neglect of theone matter closest to a single’s heart sent a message: You’re on yourown.

The fact is that most single people who doeventually marry meet their spouses through acquaintances. Eightypercent of married couples were introduced by family and friends. Ofthese, 10 percent were via blind dates. Nothing, not the Internet,not networking parties, replaces the comfort of community and what iscalled “the human credential” — someone to vouch for me.

This need for personal references, for someone whocan bring man and woman together, is great and untapped. What is atightly knit community about if not to make connections? And in a fewJewish communities, such a “someone” is already on the payroll. InSt. Louis, for example, Dr. Leah Hakimian, a math professor, isdirector of Connections of St. Louis, sponsored by the JewishFederation. She charges a modest $35 for registration, and she knowseveryone in town.

It’s nice that we’re about to discover oursingles, to let them know officially that they’re not alone. But whatsingles want are not more programs, conferences or committees; whatsingles are waiting for is an old-fashioned phone call with theheartwarming words: “Have I got a guy/gal for you!”

Marlene Adler Marks is senior columnist at TheJewish Journal. Her e-mail address is wmnsvoice@aol.com. Join herthis Sunday morning at the Skirball Cultural Center for aconversation with writers Lisa and Carolyn See.


SEND EMAIL TO MARLENE ADLER MARKS
wmnsvoice@aol.com

January 30, 1998 —TheDaughter

 

January 23, 1998 —Babysitters NoMore

 

January 16, 1998 —FalseAlarms

 

November 28, 1997 —As AmericanAs…

 

November 21, 1997 —The ThirteenWants

 

November 14, 1997 —Music to MyEars

 

November 7, 1997 —Four Takes on50

 

October 31, 1997 —ChallengingHernandez

 

October 24, 1997 —CommonGround

 

October 17, 1997 —Taking Off theMask

 

October 10, 1997 —Life’s a MixedBag

 

October 3, 1997 —And Now ForSomething Completely Different

 

September 26, 1997— An OpenHeart

 

September 19, 1997— My BronxTale

 

September 12, 1997 — Of Goddesses andSaints

 

August 22, 1997 — Who is Not a Jew

 

August 15, 1997 — A LegendaryFriendship

 

July 25, 1997 — A Perfect Orange

 

July 18, 1997 — News of Our Own

 

July 11, 1997 — Celluloid Heroes

 

July 4, 1997 — Meet theSeekowitzes

 

June 27, 1997 — The Facts of Life

 

June 20, 1997 — Reality Bites

A Woman’s Voice Read More »

Letters

Leave a Comment / Letters to the Editor, Old Stories /

Marlene Adler Marks is dead wrong. Monica Lewinskyis not the”every daughter” she proposes (“The Daughter,” Jan. 30). Monica’sfamily, mercifully is nothing like our own. The “undigested horrorsof the 20th century” have nothing to do with it.

Wretched excess, greed, and insatiable appetiteswere more likely what was played out at that dinner table. There arefar too many of us Holocaust survivors and children of survivors whohave gone forth and raised honorable decent offspring for thatridiculous claim of victimhood to be made yet again. It is an insultwith its insinuation that we are all helplessly caught in theunresolved histories of our fathers.

And just what is the “Shine” syndrome? More poppsychology? A clever hook on which to hang rather than understand aman’s complicated malady? Shall we also have to forgive Bill Clinton because of his own family’s constant uprootings?

Please, I look to The Jewish Journal forrelevance, reasonable views and intelligent discourse. MonicaLewinsky was not a Jewish issue, but now it is being made into one,and frankly, I’m disappointed that it should happen within yourpages.

Josie Levy Martin

Los Angeles

*

 

The Jewish Journal ought to be distinguished byits difference, not demeaned by its similarity. The Jewish communitydoes not need The Journal to offer snide references to”Zippergate,”or, more egregiously, to relate the content of theLewinskys’ divorce proceedings. For such “reporting,” we already havetoo many outlets.

Finally, to spin such feeble threads intospeculation as to the Holocaust’s impact on this sad incident, isboth uncharitable and unworthy. Does the “Jewish” in Jewish Journalmerely point to an ethnic affiliation, or are Jewish values somehowencompassed by that name?

The Journal was not going to scoop its competitionon a story that all of America was covering. Imagine how it mighthave been ennobled by reporting with humility on all we do not know,or at least with compassion on a tragedy that is painfully enmeshingmembers of our community.

Rabbi David Wolpe

Sinai Temple

Los Angeles

*

When I received your last issue, I thought for amoment that The Journal had been sold to a sex tabloid. Then as Ileafed through it and saw the amount of space you had devoted tol’affaire Lewinsky, I was shocked, disappointed, and then angry that youwould have joined in this cacophony of rumor, speculation andspecious gossip.

Although I have not always agreed with her, I haveadmired Ms. Adler Marks as a responsible columnist but certainly notwhen she throws in the “ethnic card” by putting on the tableLewinsky’s purported Jewishness as a connection which has not beenspotlighted.

And then to have your editorial criticize the LosAngeles Jewish community for treating her Jewishness as “only anincidental sidebar” is not only irresponsible but also ridiculous.With all the problems we Jews have, who needs that connection in thespotlight. Get real! I’m sure that many an anti-Semite thought of itbefore you did.

The Middle East may erupt momentarily, Israel isin mortal danger, the president makes an important and meaty State ofthe Union address, we will have a balanced budget and a surplus forthe first time in many years while countless thousands are homeless,and you choose to devote page after page of valuable space to thistitillation.

The ponderous, pontifically pompous Ted Koppeldevotes a program to whether oral sex is adultery. CBS starts itshourly news with “The White House in Crisis” and one after the otherjoins in the repetition and competition to see who can get thelargest audience. And now the distinguished Rabbi Elliot Dorff getsinto the fray with a scholarly discussion of the wisdom of our sagesabout whether or not penis penetration is necessary to constituteadultery.

I don’t know whether to laugh or to cry.

S. Dell Scott

Encino

*

Congratulations! You have finally recognized howto stimulate reader interest and at the same time improvecirculation: More sleaze.

The one thing I have wanted to learn: at whichTemple are Monica’s parents members. Pages and pages, articles andeditorial, all I ever wanted to learn about Monica andJewishness.

Can I hope that next week you will follow up witha feature article on Judaica and oral sex?

Julian Omerberg

Sherman Oaks

*

With apologies to Gene Lichtenstein and MarleneMarks, The New York Times attitude of “so what?” seems to me the mostappropriate response to the Jewishness of Ms. Lewinsky, whosephotograph , glared at us all week.

I was appalled to see it also on the cover of TheJewish Journal. Sorry, Marlene, but I not only take strong exceptionto your armchair analyzing — based on a movie! — as a way ofprobing the dynamics of a family you know little about, but also toyour assumption of a “we.” I and many other single and marriedmothers do not raise our daughters to worship power, “vamp forDaddy,” etc. We raise them to have personal dignity; act withintegrity; take themselves seriously as women, Jews, and people;value their bodies as well as their minds and souls, and respectearned authority while remaining healthily skeptical of merepower.

If Ms. Lewinsky actually made half the statementsattributed to her, it is her own vulgarity and her media-made grossnotoriety that are most pitiable. She and her family scarcely needwhat amounted to little more than gossip-mongering on the part of TheJournal to exacerbate one of the more prurient and repellent episodesin recent American culture. Shame on you.

Miriyam Glazer

Santa Monica

*

I am glad that The New York Times did not mentionthat Monica Lewinsky was Jewish. She is a disgrace to our religion.Please do not try to portray this young woman as a victim. She wentto Washington with a plan, and succeeded in bringing disgrace uponherself. The Jewish community should not stand behind her. We owe hernothing. I am ashamed that she was born Jewish.

How dare you mention Fred Goldman and this womanin the same breath! Fred and his family were innocent victims in atragic affair. Lewinsky brought all her troubles upon herself.

As for Marlene Adler Marks: Please spare us the”victim” alibi. Many of us came from families with parents who foughtand/or divorced. That didn’t give us the right to behaveinappropriately.

Fern Reisner

Los Angeles

Monica and Israel

I was astounded to read that some right-wingJewish circles speculate with satisfaction that the Lewinsky scandalimpaired Clinton’s ability to constrain Netanyahu during the latter’svisit here (“Saved by the Belle,” Jan. 30). If this is really theprevailing right-wing Jewish viewpoint, it may be disastrous fortheir own interests.

Impairing Clinton’s ability to constrain Netanyahualso impairs Clinton’s ability to constrain Saddam Hussein.Right-wing Jewish folk willing to risk a less-constrained Saddam inorder to get a less-constrained Netanyahu should recognize that onegoes along with the other.

I am reminded of the case of Rabbi Kupersztoch ofPoland. The rabbi was enraged when some young men of his flock wereexecuted by the czar for trying to avoid conscription.

Years later, during World War I, the rabbi tookhis revenge by tipping off the German high command about Russiantroop placements, leading to a major German victory. The rabbi andhis flock moved to Germany under German sponsorship, and was laterprotected against Nazi excesses by the German military.

When the rabbi died in 1940, his flock was nolonger protected and was subsequently sent to various camps. Sosometimes a leader can grasp for immediate advantage, at the cost ofthe long-term viability of a larger group that includes hisown.

This seems to be the case for those Jewish leaderswho take satisfaction in seeing Clinton undermined because theybelieve some uncertain short-term advantage will be gained. Those whofollow such leaders may be badly misled.

Larry Selk

Los Angeles

 

THE JEWISH JOURNAL welcomes letters from allreaders. Letters should be no more than 250 words and we reserve theright to edit for space. All letters must include a signature, validaddress and phone number. Pseudonyms and initials will not be used,but names will be withheld on request. Unsolicited manuscripts andother materials should include a self-addressed, stamped envelope inorder to be returned.Publisher, Stanley Hirsh

THE JEWISH JOURNAL welcomes letters from allreaders. Letters should be no more than 250 words and we reserve theright to edit for space. All letters must include a signature, validaddress and phone number. Pseudonyms and initials will not be used,but names will be withheld on request. Unsolicited manuscripts andother materials should include a self-addressed, stamped envelope inorder to be returned.Publisher, Stanley Hirsh

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Managing editor, Robert Eshman

Assistant editor, Stig Jantz

Calendar and copy editor, William Yelles

Senior writer, NaomiPfefferman

Staff writer, RuthStroud

Production coordinator and

online editor, SaraEve Roseman

Community editor,Michael Aushenker

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Senior Columnist, Marlene Adler Marks

National Correspondent, J. J. Goldberg

Contributing writers, James David Besser (Washington), Larry Derfner (Tel Aviv),Rabbi Ed Feinstein, Linda Feldman, Beverly Gray, Joel Kotkin, RabbiSteven Leder, Yehuda Lev, Deborah Berger-Reiss, Eric Silver(Jerusalem), Teresa Strasser

Contributing editor, Tom Tugend

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Photo/Graphics, Carvin Knowles

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Ed Brennglass (1919-1997), Willard Chotiner, IrwinDaniels, Irwin Field, David Finegood, Herbert Gelfand, Osias Goren,Richard Gunther, Stanley Hirsh, Marvin Kristan, Mark Lainer

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THE JEWISH JOURNAL (ISSN 0888-0468) USPS 468530 ispublished weekly, every Thursday for $23.50 (out of state add $12.50)by Los Angeles Jewish Publications Inc., a community nonprofitcorporation, 3660 Wilshire Boulevard, Suite 204, Los Angeles,California 90010. Address all mail to: Jewish Journal, 3660 WilshireBoulevard, Suite 204, Los Angeles, California 90010. Phone213-738-7778, Fax 213-368-1684. E-mail at Los Angeles Freenet,ab871@lafn.org

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POSTMASTER: Send address changes to THE JEWISHJOURNAL, 3660 Wilshire Boulevard, Suite 204, Los Angeles, California90010. THE JEWISH JOURNAL is not responsible for unsolicitedmanuscripts or photographs. They will not be returned unless senderenclosed return postage.

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Power, Politics And People

Leave a Comment / Old Stories, Politics /

Israeli lawmaker Alex Lubotsky was having a bad day on Jan. 29. Hehad come to Jerusalem’s Ramada hotel to address a visiting group ofOrthodox Jews from America, to plead for their support of thecompromise conversion plan authored by Finance Minister YaakovNeeman.

He didn’t have much luck. The visitors, leaders of the Union ofOrthodox Jewish Congregations of America, displayed more skepticismthan an Arkansas grand jury. Most, witnesses said, looked as thoughthey would rather be anywhere but in that room, being asked to standup and do the right thing. Rabbi Beryl Wein, a transplanted NewYorker sharing the dais with Lubotsky, reportedly captured the moodwhen he said that he was glad he wasn’t the one who had to make thedecision.

The decision — whether the Neeman plan will become reality –rests with Israel’s Orthodox chief rabbis. The plan requires them tolet Conservative and Reform rabbis help train would-be converts toJudaism. Orthodox rabbis would still perform the actual conversionritual. Non-Orthodox rabbis would be junior partners — less thanthey wanted, but much more than the Orthodox rabbinate wanted to givethem. The non-Orthodox movements have accepted. The chief rabbishaven’t decided, but all signs are negative.

Lubotsky, an ally of Neeman, was hoping that the Orthodox Unionwould help nudge the chief rabbis toward compromise. As the mainAmerican voice of centrist, or “modern” Orthodoxy, the OU has longfavored keeping lines open to the non-Orthodox world. That’s also thephilosophy of Modern Orthodox Israelis such as Neeman and Lubotsky.It’s supposed to be the view of the chief rabbinate too.

Modernity is not what it used to be, however. Nowadays, thedecisive force in Orthodoxy is the relentless gravitational pull ofthe right-wing or “ultra-Orthodox” rabbinate, which rejects allcompromise with sinners. Fearing the purists’ wrath, nobody wants tocross them. Not the Orthodox Union in America, not the chief rabbisin Israel. In contemporary Orthodoxy, bridge-building is out.Fence-building is in.

Three days earlier and 7,000 miles west, the top leaders of Reformand Conservative Judaism held a press conference in New York on Jan.26 to give their own view of the Neeman plan, which had gone to theprime minister the day before.

They planned to lament the chief rabbis’ anticipated rejection ofNeeman. This, they figured, would prove who is ready to makesacrifices for Jewish unity and who isn’t. To their surprise, theliberal rabbis woke up that Monday to find themselves outflanked bytheir own troops. While they slept, their negotiators in Israel weremeeting with a representative of the chief rabbinate, at the home ofJewish Agency chairman Avraham Burg, to concoct a competingcompromise. It was the only way, Burg explained, to avoid a blowupwhen the chief rabbis reject Neeman.

The Burg plan lets the chief rabbis off the hook. Instead of aunified conversion process, each movement would continue its ownconversions. All converts would be registered as Jews by Israel’sstate population registry, with a notation of the date they becameJewish. But only Orthodox converts would be recognized by the chiefrabbinate, which still controls marriage, divorce, adoption andburial. This way, the non-Orthodox movements get governmentrecognition, just as they wanted, while the Orthodox retain the powerto ensure it doesn’t do them any good.

Gone is the immediate danger of conversions causing a governmentcollapse or an Israel-Diaspora explosion. Instead, look for anexplosion next year over marriages, as a growing army of non-Orthodoxconverts battles discrimination.

Both the Neeman and Burg plans could defuse, at least for now, theincendiary tensions fracturing the Jewish world. Community leadersare hailing them as nearly interchangeable, the Burg plan merely anarrower, more “technical” fix than Neeman.

In fact, as some top rabbis admit privately, the two plans arepolar opposites. Neeman, by creating one intermovement conversionprocedure, would strengthen the role of the Israeli government as acentral, unifying voice in Jewish life. Its champions see it as astep — albeit a baby step — toward healing the historic breachesdividing Judaism’s streams.

The Burg plan does the reverse. By getting the Israeli governmentout of the business of deciding whose conversions are legitimate, itis a decisive first step toward separation of synagogue and state.The rest — removing marriage, divorce and burial from Orthodoxrabbinic control — is just a matter of time. Each movement would befree to go its own way, without regard to others’ standards.

Already, the two proposals have begun to redraw the map of thereligious pluralism debate. Up to now, the struggle has dividedOrthodox Jews from non-Orthodox. With the arrival of the Burg plan,the debate is between the center and the edges.

On one side are the Conservative and Modern Orthodox movements,which enthusiastically favor Neeman. They view it as a historic steptoward recreating a common code of Jewish law, modified formodernity, which all Jews could begin to accept. That’s exactly whatthey stand for.

On the other side are the Reform and ultra-Orthodox movements,which are happiest with Burg. Both groups would just as soon get theJewish state out of the business of determining Jewish law — theReform, because they don’t believe in the idea of a binding Jewishlaw; the ultra-Orthodox, because they don’t fully accept the Jewishstate.

Reform and Conservative leaders alike insist that there is nochance of a near-term breakup in their strategic alliance. Bothmovements are still denied any recognition in Israel. They’ll fighttogether until they get it. For now, both have endorsed both Neemanand Burg, with varying enthusiasm.

Both sides admit, however, that the latest twist has brought theirdifferences to the surface quite sharply. It’s no longer hard toimagine the two allies on opposite sides in the not-too-distantfuture.

Which side will come out on top — centrism or fragmentation? IfAlex Lubotsky’s experience last week means anything, don’t bet moneyon the center.

J.J. Goldberg is author of “Jewish Power: Inside the AmericanJewish Establishment.” He writes regularly for The JewishJournal.

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Spectator

Leave a Comment / Old Stories /

The sixth annual Pan African Film Festival, the largest U.S.festival dedicated to black cinema, will exhibit more than 60features, shorts and documentaries from across North America, Africa,Europe and the South Pacific. Of particular interest to the Jewishcommunity is the documentary “Blacks and Jews,” which examines theissues confronting both groups by telling five contemporary stories:a West Indian man who saves the life of a Chassid in Crown Heights atthe peak of the 1991 riots; a conflict between black home buyers andJewish real estate speculators in a Chicago neighborhood; one man’sjourney through the Nation of Islam and Farrakhan’s anti-Semitism;stereotypes about Jewish control of Hollywood; and themuch-publicized Oakland high school students who were kicked out of ascreening of “Schindler’s List.”

“Blacks and Jews” will show on Sunday, Feb. 8, 12:15 p.m., at theMagic Johnson Theatres in the Baldwin Hills Crenshaw Plaza, corner ofMartin Luther King Jr. and Crenshaw boulevards. The festival runsthrough Feb. 16. For complete program information, call (213)295-1706.

Maverick Tribute

This weekend, the American Cinematheque begins its “Hard, Fast andIn Control: The Films of Robert Aldrich” series with “Ulzana’s Raid,”which stars Burt Lancaster and Bruce Davison in an epic vision of theAmerican West, Friday, Feb. 6, at 7:15 p.m. At 9:30 p.m., a noirdouble feature of “World for Ransom” and a restored print of “Kiss MeDeadly” will screen. On Saturday, Feb. 7, Aldrich’s “What EverHappened to Baby Jane?” starring Bette Davis and Joan Crawford, willshow at 7:15 p.m., and the noir double feature will repeat at 9:45p.m.

What EverHappened to Baby Jane?”

Next weekend includes some of his television work as well as adouble feature of “The Big Knife,” starring Jack Palance, Ida Lupinoand Shelley Winters, and the World War II drama “Attack.” Thefestival will conclude on Saturday, Feb. 21, with a screening of “TheLongest Yard,” with Burt Reynolds and Eddie Albert starring.

Separate admission is required for all screenings, which are heldat the Raleigh Studios’ Charlie Chaplin Theater, 5300 Melrose Ave.,Hollywood. Call (213) 466-FILM for information, or (818) 789-8499 fortickets.

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Federation Matters

Leave a Comment / Old Stories /

In 1948, the world agreed to the creation of the State of Israel in a moment of stricken conscience over its outrageous failure to stop or even attempt to mitigate the effects of the Holocaust.

Their motives were mostly cynical. The immorality of their failure was so gross as to require something postitive to put in the history books. In addition, they knew that there were only 600,000 Jews living there, surrounded by five armies representing 50 million Arabs dedcicated to their own form of “final solutions.”

In the past 50 years Israel has been subjected to countless wars, an untold number of terrorist acts, repeated suicide bombers, scud missiles, and every form of unprovoked attack, and heinous acts both inside and outside the state. And yet, our people not only survived, they prevailed.

Israel’s accomplishments have never been matched by any other people this small in such a short period of time in the history of the world. But they didn’t do it alone. The part played in the creation and sustaining of the Jewish state by world Jewry, especially American Jews, is without parallel and without question, crucial to Israel’s survival.

This year is the 50th anniversary of the creation of the state and we must celebrate it. And the celebration should be on a scale to match all of our accomplishments.

With this in mind, your Federation, along with many other Federations and Jewish institutions here, in Israel, and around the world, are preparing all kinds of events. We have already begun with an extremely successful Community Mission to Israel next November. Last year, the Los Angeles Federation took 400 members of our community, which was the largest mission to visit Israel from the United States in all of 1997.

Over 3,000 people attended a marvelous Chanukah candle lighting ceremony held at the Westside Pavilion, a record crowd.

On April 14, Los Angeles will host a star-studded national television show, which will be broadcast by CBS. It is being produced by Gil Cates, producer of the Academy Awards, together with Don Mischer, producer of the Emmy show and will be written by Larry Gelbart, the man who created TV’s “M*A*S*H.” Celebrity performers are now being engaged for the evening.

The production will take place at the 6,300-seat Shrine Auditorium and will be followed by a gala kosher l’Pesach reception for VIP sponsors and entertainers. For all others, the tickets are being priced to assure that everyone can attend. The show and gala will be jointly sponsored by Federation and the Simon Wiesenthal Center. You’re all invited to what we know will be the largest, most exciting 50th birthday party in the world.

On May 3, at the Pan Pacific Park, Federation, together with the local council of Israeli organizations, are producing a giant Jewish Festival in honor of Israel’s 50th. We expect at least 50,000 people with the cooperation of our synagogues, Jewish institutions, Jewish schools and any other communal partners.

There are many other events now being planned — some educational, some cultural, all exciting.

The excitement is beginning to grow. The first events have been huge successes and bode well for the future. So get your party hats and dancing shoes on and get ready for a great 1998.

As part of these celebrations, we’re preparing a tribute bookhonoring people and families who were instrumental in Israel’s creation, frequently at great personal risk and sometimes in violation of U.S. neutrality laws. For example, Amy Paul’s late father, Yoland “Yudi” Markson helped purchase U.S. World War II ships for salvage, utilizing vital parts of 10 ships to create one good one for Israel’s fledgling navy.

Arie Belldegrun’s late father-in-law, Shlomo Zabludowicz, a Holocaust survivor and gifted engineer, formed an arms company called Soltam, which over the next 30 years became a mainstay of the Israeli security industry, at a time when most arms markets were closed to the Jewish state.

Sandra Brown’s father, Sam Lewis, a chief pilot and instructor for TWA and part of the U.S. Air Force in World War II, was an early member of Machal, a famous group of foreign volunteers who exported aircraft, supplies and pilots to Israel. He flew World War II surplus planes from California to Panama and Mexico City and then to Israel by way of Suriname, Brazil, Senegal, Casablanca and Sicily. His real life escapades during the War of Independence, and afterwards as one of the first captains of El Al, would make a movie star’s fictional adventures pale by comparison.

David Karney served on a team in Israel receiving Messerschmidt fighter aircraft from Czechoslovakia, flown in as “parts” inside Dakota DC3s by Machal members and converted immediately into what became the Israeli “fighter” air force.

Victor and Adrea Carter worked tirelessly fundraising with Teddy Kollek and many members of his family. His cousin, Eleanor Rudnick, who owned an airfield in Bakersfield, trained the first 13 Israel aviation cadets. She was later convicted and fined for her activities.

Bernie Ceazan’s father, Julius, was deeply involved with Sid Levine, Stanley Slotkin, and Ike Greenberg, in shipping to Israel bulletproof vests and other military supplies as furniture and other “legitimate” products.

Joe and Bud Feldman’s father, Jack, shipped empty oil drums from Los Angeles to New Orleans, where they were barged to Tampico, Mexico, to be filled with fuel and added the proper chemicals to make aviation fuel when it arrived in Israel.

Chet Firestein’s father, Max, UJWF chair in 1945-46, raised money for Israel and took Hollywood moguls Sam Goldwyn and others on missions there.

Frieda Meltzer put together the first blood bank with her own Hadassah, Pioneer Women, Mizarchi, B’nai B’rith and UJWF workers. The blood was shipped to Oakland where it was processed and sent to Israel.

All of these “eyewitness accounts” were given to us by members of our local community. You may know of others who were instrumental in Israel becoming a state. We invite you or someone you know who has an interesting story to contact our editor, Sheli Teitlebaum at 818-597-9523 to record your story.

John Fishel is executive vice president of The Jewish Federation of Greater Los Angeles.

All rights reserved by author.

For more information on the Jewish Federation go to <A HREF=”http://www.jewishla.org”> The Jewish Federation of Greater L.A.’s Web Page</A></P><BR>

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The Big Fear

Leave a Comment / Old Stories /

There was such a crush of people at the gas-maskdistribution center in Tel Aviv’s Central Bus Station this week thata portable fence had to be set up at the doorway — just to keeppeople from pushing their way in.

About 100 people were pressed up against thefence. Many were shouting at the soldiers, who looked clearlyoverwhelmed. A few goofy teen-agers grabbed the loudspeaker out of asoldier’s hand and began making siren sounds — like the ones thatannounced the falling of Scuds during the Gulf War.

“Is there going to be a war or not?” asked EstherLevian, 60. “Why do I have to wait here for hours when they say thegas mask won’t do you any good anyway?”

“It’s better to wait than to die,” said oneman.

The Big Fear has hit Israel. No amount ofreassurances from Israeli leaders and defense experts that Saddam ishighly, highly unlikely to attack Israel, will calm people down. Asurvey by Dr. Mina Tsemach, Israel’s leading public opinion pollster,found that 52 percent of Israelis believe that if the U.S. attacksIraq, Saddam will fire missiles on Israel. Fifty-three percent saidthat they feel unprotected against biological or chemicalweapons.

Explanations from experts that Saddam knows Israelwill wipe him out if he attacks with nonconventional weapons, andthat the Iraqi arsenal isn’t nearly as formidable as it used to be,haven’t had much calming effect. “Saddam is crazy. Anything canhappen,” was the refrain repeated over and over again at the gas-maskcenter. “I don’t trust anything anybody tells me,” was anotherpopular sentiment.

Hysteria was spreading, in no small part, due tothe media. The daily tabloids were running stories with big headlinessuch as “Anthrax: The Quiet Killer.” Radio interviewers refused totake no for an answer to their questions about the imminence of war,and pressed on: “What if? What if missiles loaded with anthrax landon Israel?” The experts being interviewed would comply by describinga dreadful but hypothetical scenario; the interviewer — and tens ofthousands of listeners — would forget about the hypothetical andonly remember the dreadful; and the fear just grew and grew.

A sonic boom went off over the skies of Tel Aviv– something that happens all the time — and there were so manycalls to police that radio announcers had to explain that it was justa sonic boom, not Saddam’s missiles.

The Netanyahu government at first instituted a”low profile” information policy — meaning that government officialssaid precious little except that the authorities had things undercontrol, and that there was no need for panic. The government’sreasoning was that too many messages might confuse the public andworry them even more.

This policy came under attack from just abouteverybody. “There is no better way of throwing an entire nation intoa fit of anxiety and panic than by continually reminding its citizensthat they have no reason to feel anxiety or panic,” wrote veteranHa’aretz columnist Yoel Marcus.

So, on Tuesday, a lineup of army generals andhealth officials gave a high-profile press conference and said, inone voice, that there was a minuscule chance of an Iraqi attack onIsrael. And even if, in a last-ditch, desperation move, Saddammanaged to load one of his few launchers with some of his fewmissiles and succeed in hitting Israel, people’s gas masks and sealedrooms offered them sure protection. If anybody happened to be withouthis or her gas mask when chemical or biological agents fell nearthem, the hospitals and clinics had enough antidotes to neutralizethe danger, officials insisted.

But it wasn’t certain that even the amended policyof talking to the public would have the desired effect. Referring toreports that Prime Minister Netanyahu was preparing to “address thenation” — which, as of the beginning of the week, he didn’t do — awoman at the Tel Aviv distribution center said, “This proves thatsomething serious is going on.”

Part of the problem was the public’s memory of howIsraeli authorities prepared them for the Gulf War. In many cases,their memories were wholly distorted. “They told us nothing was goingto happen the last time, and look what happened,” said one man. Infact, everyone knew, and everyone said that Saddam was going to bombIsrael in 1991.

“The head of the air force said that the worst theScuds could do was make a little hole in a wall, and the Scudsknocked down buildings,” said one woman, insistingly. The head of theair force, of course, never made such a ridiculous statement.

But the authorities did tell Israelis before andduring the Gulf War that their best protection was to pick out a roomin their apartment, seal its doors and windows with masking tapeagainst gas or biological agents, and sit out the Scuds inside. Thegas and biological agents never arrived, but the Scuds did, and thesealed rooms and masking tape were no defense against them.

So uncertainty, mistrust and galloping fear are inthe Israeli air today as a U.S. attack on Iraq seems to draw closer.Hearing my American-accented Hebrew, a woman at the distributioncenter asked if I could help her get to the United States.

Malka Revuen, 50, said that she didn’t believe thegas mask would do any good against chemical or biological weaponsanyway. Then why was she willing to wait hours to get one? “In asituation like this, you hang onto anything you can for security.It’s psychological.”

Former air force commander Avihu Bin-Nun said thatIsraelis were fighting Saddam’s psychological war for him. “He’s noteven threatening us; we’re threatening ourselves.”

As a woman at the distribution center put it: “Ifeverybody’s talking about the danger, then Saddam’s already gottenthe better of us.”

All rights reserved by author.

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