Page 4-THE NEWS-November 1990
World Beat
Site of YugoslMviMn Syntgogue
To be Returned to Town’s Jews
GENEVA (JTA) — The site
of the Main Synagogue of Za
greb, Yugoslavia, built in 1867
and destroyed by the Ustachi
fascists in 1941, will be restored
to the Jewish community of
Zagreb, its rightful owners, and
a new community center will be
built.
The pledge was made by Dr.
Franjo Tudjmann, president of
the Yugoslavian Republic of
Croatia, at a meeting with Rabbi
Arthur Schneier of the Park East
Synagogue in Manhattan.
In his talk with the Croatian
president, Schneier emphasized
the symbolic value of rebuilding
the Zagreb synagogue at its
former location on Praska
Street. The site where it once
stood is now a parking lot.
Schneier made his request at
the urging of the Zagreb Jewish
community, which numbers
about 1,200.
Oldest Fresh Water Well Found
TEL AVIV (JTA) — The
world’s oldest fresh-water well
has been found on the ocean
floor about 1,300 feet offshore
from Atlit, on the Mediterra
nean coast south of Haifa.
Its age has been estimated at
8,000 years, which is about 1,000
years older than the previous
oldest well discovered in Turkey.
The project is sponsored by
the Education Ministry’s Affit
Yam Antiquities Authority.
Digging has been underway for
six seasons.
The 26-foot-deep well lies
about 16 feet below the ocean
surface but was originally about
1,300 feet inland from the shore.
It appears to have been aban
doned as a well when salt water
encroached on the land as the
sea level rose at the end of the
last Ice Age.
It was used as a garbage dump
for about 150 years, until the
village was forced to move
further inland because of the
advancing sea.
The debris and sand helped
preserve the well. Its discoverers
said they were amazed by the
sophisticated technology of its
construction. The builders
walled it with close-fitting stones
starting from the top and work
ing downward, which is how
wells are constructed in modern
times.
The detritus inside and scat
tered around the well are ena
bling archaeologists to recon
struct a pre-pottery Neolithic
“B” period village. The remains
show a village that covered an
area of 10 acres and was pop
ulated by some 30 families.
It provides a picture of a Stone
Age society during the period
when prehistoric man was mak
ing the transition from nomad
to farmer.
Argentine Governnient Body Urges
Repeal of ‘Zionism is Racism ’
BUENOS AIRES (JTA) —
The Chamber of Deputies, Ar
gentina’s legislative body, has
urged the government to “pro
mote the abrogation” of the
U.N, General Assembly’s 1975
resolution equating Zionism
with racism.
The chamber resolved by a
huge majority that the 15-year-
old measure “hinders the peace
ful solution of the Middle East
problem.”
Argentine Foreign Minister
Domingo Cavallo made the
same point in his address to the
General Assembly in New York.
Argentine President Carlos
Saul Menem has pledged his
government would support ef
forts to rescind the anti-Zionist
resolution.
Similar undertakings have
been made by President Fernan
do Collor de Mello of Brazil, the
Senate of Venezuela and the
president of Uruguay, Luis
Alberto Lacalle. De Mello told
World Jewish Congress Presi
dent Edgar Bronfman that his
country’s vote for the resolution
in 1975 was a “mistake” which
he would rectify. Lacalle also
told the WJC that he would help
organize the Latin American
states against the resolution.
According to Elan Steinberg,
executive director of the WJC
in New York, action to repudiate
the resolution could come as
early as next year’s session of the
General Assembly.
In New York, Bernice Tan-
nenbaum, president of the
World Zionist Organization-
American Section, said, “The
time is ripe for the United
Nations to cleanse itself from the
taint and dishonor it inflicted
upon itself by adopting this anti-
Semitic resolution.”
Israel Drops Efforts to Suppress
Printing ofMossadBook in Canada
TORONTO (JTA) — A book
purporting to expose the activ
ities of Israel’s secret intelligence
agency, Mossad, went on sale in
Canada, after the Israeli govern
ment dropped legal attempts to
have it banned.
Israel decided not to seek
renewal of the temporary injunc
tion it obtained from the Ontario
Court, of Justice, because the
book’s publication in the United
States rendered the issue moot.
Israel had claimed the revela
tions contained in the book,
however false, would compro
mise the safety of Mossad
agents. Persuaded by that argu
ment, a New York State Su
preme Court judge in Manhat
tan temporarily restrained pub
lication of the book.
But his order was quashed the
following day by the court’s
Appellate Division. St. Martin’s
Press immediately stepped up
publication of the book, 17,000
copies of which had already been
sent to wholesalers.
“The harm we were seeking to
prevent has already occurred,”
Joel Goldenberg, a Canadian
lawyer representing Israel in the
case, told the Ontario court.
He was referring to publica
tion in the United States of “By
Way of Deception: A Devastat
ing Insider’s View of the Mos
sad,” written by Canadian-born
Victor Ostrovsky along with
Canadian journalist Claire Hoy.
Ostrovsky, who holds dual
Canadian-Israeli citizenship,
worked for Mossad from 1984
to 1986. Israeli officials say he
was dismissed as “unfit” after 18
months as a trainee.
His book offers alleged inside
information on Mossad opera
tions that portray the Israeli spy
agency’s activities in Canada and
the United States as cynical and
self-serving.
Among other things, the book
alleges that Israel deliberately
avoided providing the United
States with advance information
it had about Lebanese terrorists’
plans to bomb the United States
Marine barracks in Beirut in
October 1983.
The book alleges that Israel
withheld the information from
the United States because it
knew the incident, which
claimed 241 lives, would strain
U.S.-Arab relations.
Israeli officials described the
book as a “fiction with a sprin
kling of facts.”
But Israel’s image abroad
apparently was more seriously
damaged by its attempts to
suppress the book than by the
alleged exposes.
The episode was the subject
of a closed-door inquiry in
Jerusalem by the Knesset For
eign Affairs and Defense Com
mittee’s subcommittee on intel
ligence. The panel heard a report
from the chief of Mossad, whose
identity is top secret.
A campaign was mounted in
Israel to discredit Ostrovsky,
who was described as a prevar
icator motivated by greed and
a grudge against Mossad.
But some Israeli circles believe
the government would have been
wiser to ignore the book, which
they say would have attracted
few readers and been quickly
forgotten were it not for the
efforts to suppress it.
St. Martin’s Press reported
that the notoriety surrounding
the attempted ban had boosted
its sales by 300 percent.
East Germany Issues Jewish Stamps
BONN (JTA) — On the eve
of unification. East Germany
has issued two postage stamps
in honor of the Jewish New
Year. The stamps are of 50 and
30 pfennig denominations.
One pictures the famous for
mer synagogue on Oranienbur-
gerstrasse in East Berlin, which
is undergoing extensive renova
tion to become a Jewish admin
istrative and cultural center. The
other honors Louis Lewandows-
ki (1821 -1894), who served as the
synagogue’s choral director.
Part of the revenue from the
sale of the stamps has been
earmarked for the foundation
financing the renovation work.
Purchasers who want to contrib
ute add 15 pfennigs to the price
of the stamps.
Sale of Historic Shul Allows
Building to Survive
BOSTON (JTA) — The 71-
year-old Vilna Shul, an historic
landmark on Beacon Hill, will
continue to serve Boston’s Jew
ish community.
Justice Ruth Abrams of the
Supreme Judicial Court ap
proved its sale Sept. 26 to
Historic Boston Inc., a non
profit corporation, provided
that the $429,000 purchase price
can be raised by Sept. 26, 1991.
The Vilna Shul on Phillips
Street is the only synagogue in
Boston listed in the National
Register of Historic Places, and
is the only building in Boston
to retain continuous Jewish
identity since its construction in
1919, A non-profit organization,
the Vilna Center for Jewish
Heritage is being incorporated
to raise the money and to own
and operate the Shul,
The organization plans to
open a Jewish cultural center in
the building for use on Jewish
holidays and other occasions by
all branches of Judaism —
Orthodox, Conservative, Re
form and Reconstructionist.
The pending sale covers the
entire contents of the shul,
including an elaborately carved
wooden ark in the main sanc
tuary on the second floor. Sev
eral valuable Torahs, which have
been held in safekeeping outside
of the shul, were not included
in the sale.
Abrams’ ruling climaxed a
legal struggle that began in 1985,
at the height of the local real
estate boom, when the shul was
slated to be dissolved. The
money was to go to charities in
Israel, which were designated by
officers of the Vilna Shul in legal
documents signed 20 years ago.
The nearby Charles River
Park Synagogue (now the Bos
ton synagogue) intervened, in
voking the cypres rule, to be
come the beneficiary of the
proceeds from the sale.
Individual Jews and gentiles
living on Beacon Hill as well as
the Syngagogue Council of
Massachusetts attempted unsuc
cessfully to become parties in the
dissolution proceedings, so that
they could fight either to recon- .
stitute the shul or at least to ^
preserve it as a reminder of early
Jewish immigrant life in Boston.
Tid-Bits
PARIS (JTA) — One of the
first acts of unified Germany was
to acknowledge guilt for its Nazi
past, according to assurances
made to a delegation of French
Jews visiting Bonn.
•
LONDON (JTA) — Vandals
struck the Jewish cemetery at
Failsworth in the Greater Man
chester spraying 41 gravestones
with anti-Semitic graffiti.
The doors to a chapel were
daubed with swastikas and Stars
of David suspended from gal
lows.
The incident was the eighth
major instance of Jewish cem
etery desecration in Britain since
the Edmonton cemetery in
North London was attacked in
May.
That occurred a few days after
a vicious assault on the ancient
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