Holiday
Shopping
Guide
pages 14-15
5007 Providence Rd.
Charlotte, NC 28226
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Permit No. 1208
The Charlotte ^TEWISH ^^NEWS
Vol. 15 No. 11
Charlotte, North Carolina
December 1993
Federation/UJA Shabbat Weekend
To Feature Dr. Reuven Hazan
JCC Presents “A Night in Venice”
The Jewish Federation of
Greater Charlotte, in conjunc
tion with Temple Beth El and
Temple Israel, will host a Fed
eration/UJA Shabbat weekend
Jan. 22-23. Featured speaker.
Dr. Reuven Hazan, will discuss
“Israel and the Peace Process;
The Changing Dynamic in the
Middle East.”
Dr. Hazan is currently on the
faculty of the Political Science
Department at Hebrew Univer
sity in Jerusalem. He received his
PhD in Political Science from
Columbia University. Prior to
joining the staff of Hebrew
University, Dr. Hazan was Par
liamentary Assistant to Abba
Eban. Additionally he served in
Dr. Reuven Hazan
the Israeli Foreign Office and
was stationed at the office of the
Consulate General of Israel in
New York.
“A Night in Venice,’ the an
nual Gala Auction and Dinner
Dance of the Jewish Community
Center, is being held at the JCC
on Dec. 11 at 7:30 p.m. Proceeds
will benefit the JCC Senior
Aduh and Youth Programs.
Don’t be left out of this
magnificent evening. The dinner
will be catered by “Something
Else” and you will dance to the
music of “Easy Street.” The
auction will be bigger and better
than ever, with a very wide
variety of items, among them
trips, jewelry, gift certificates,
dinners at some of Charlotte’s
finest restaurants; the list goes
on and on.
Some tickets are still available
at $125 per couple ($85 is tax
U.S. Query to Moscow:
“What Happened to Raoul Wallenberg?”
By William Korey
Next month marks the half-
century anniversary commemo
rating a unique American rela
tionship with a foreigner, Raoul
Wallenberg. But if that relation
ship is to go beyond mere cel
ebration and take on substance,
the Clinton Administration will
have to pose a vigorous chal
lenge to Moscow concerning a
continuing cover-up of one of
our epoch’s great crimes.
President Franklin D. Roose
velt created the U.S. War Ref
ugee Board in January 1944 with
the task of saving Jews and other
Nazi victims in Europe. When
the Nazis occupied Hungary in
March of that year, Washington
prevailed upon neutral Sweden
to open a special section of its
legation in Budapest to help
rescue Hungarian Jewry (no
Allied power had been allowed
to perform such a role).
Selected to head the distinc
tive and unusual diplomatic
section—which served as a ver
itable outpost of U.S. non
military intervention—was 32-
year-old Raoul Wallenberg, a
distinguished Swedish diplomat
who had studied architecture at
the University of Michigan.
Wallenberg arrived in Budap
est in July 1944 with a virtual
“mission impossible” task. The
exploits of the extraordinarily
gifted and courageous diplomat
in fulfilling the War Refugee
Board’s mandate are too well-
known to require detailed reca
pitulation, A dynamic combina
tion of nerve, bluff and pluck
enabled him to rescue from
death marches and gas chambers
a remnant of European Jewry
and, thereby, stem—at least in
part—the tide of carnage.
In January 1945—with chaos
reigning in Budapest as the
advancing Soviet Red Army
took control of most of the
city—the KGB seized Wallen
berg, flew him to Moscow, and
jailed him in the notorious
Lubyanka prison. A massive
cover-up then began.
At first, Moscow declared it
was protecting Wallenberg.
Then it denied that he was in
the USSR. A decade later,
“evidence” was produced that
Wallenberg had died of a heart
attack. More recently, that
documentation was called into
serious question, even as it was
asserted that all the pertinent
files had somehow been des
troyed.
If some KGB documentation
has since been made available,
other records have been delib
erately suppressed by the au
thorities. The cover-up con
tinues. Precisely why Wallen
berg was arrested and what
happened to him afterwards
remain shielded from public
view.
In the beginning, high-rank
ing American officials such as
Secretary of State Edward Stet-
tinius and Treasury Secretary
Henry Morgenthau, Jr., pressed
Moscow—unsuccessfully—for
an accounting of Wallenberg’s
fate. During the 1980s, Ameri
can officials—using the Helsinki
human rights process as their
public platform—were persis
tent about raising the issue with
their Soviet counterparts.
Still, these interventions re
mained at the ambassadorial
level, and did not indicate to
Moscow that a deep preoccupa
tion about Wallenberg was felt
at the highest levels of policy
making. But that's precisely
where it ought to be, given
Wallenberg’s desperate efforts in
support of American human
rights policies.
In January, the 50th anniver
sary of the establishment of the
War Refugee Board will take
place. It would be a fitting
tribute to its legacy for President
Clinton to insist that Russian
President Boris Yeltsin provide
a complete accounting of what
happened to Raoul Wallenberg.
•
William Korey is the former
Director of International Policy
Research at B'nai B'rith. He is
the author of Promises We
Keep: Human Rights, The Hel
sinki Declaration and American
Foreign Policy, published by St.
Martin's Press.
(Reprinted from Near
Report.^
East
In The News
Calendar
9
JCC
.... 16-17
—Special Features—
Community News ..
... 8-10
Lubavitch
.... 12-13
Dining Out/ Ent. ...
... 21-23
Recipes
25
Jews By Choice
Ed-Op
2-3
Resettlement
........ 7
Page 18
Eng./Marriages ...
,.. 26-27
Teen Page
19
Life in Tbilisi
Family Services ...
6
This ’n That
18
Federation
,. 5 A 25
World Beat
4
Page 25
Guests at last year’s gala enjoyed the “line dancing*^
File Photo
deductible). Table reservations
and general reservations are to
be made through Becky Cohen
at the JCC, 366-5007. You must
have at least 10 people to reserve
a separate table; others will be
seated by the committee. Dress
informally and enjoy the Italian
cuisine, the music and the auc
tion and know that while you
are having a great time, you will
be helping others.
Louis Silverstein, c. 1900, son of Benjamin Silverstein, a founder
of the first Charlotte Jewish congregation, Agudath Achim (1895),
the forerunner of Temple Israel. Photo/H. Baumgarten, Charlotte’s
first commercial photographer and a founding trustee of the Hebrew
Benevolent Society (the Hebrew Cemetery in 1870).
The Public Library
and
The Charlotte Jewish Historical Society
request the pleasure of your company
at a reception to mark the opening of
“Seventh Street to Shalom Park”
a multimedia exhibit celebrating our Jewish heritage
on Sunday, the fifth of December
at seven o’clock
at the Main Library
310 North Tryon Street, Charlotte
Musical entertainment by Viva Klezmer!
City Fair |Mrliing will be validated
(Please see page 11 for December and January Special Events)