The Open Question

ON THE MORNING of Wednesday July 23, 1969, Gamal Abdel Nasser reiterated for the ninety- : ninth time in twenty months that he regarded the cease-fire agreement be_ tween Israel and the belligerent Arab _ States as null and void. On the same day Eldridge Cleaver surfaced in AlI- – giers and joined his hosts in denounc_ ing America and Israel as enemies of mankind. In this he was echoed by _ Stokely Carmichael, also an honored _ guest at a cultural conclave in the land of Boumédienne, who topped Cleaver by declaring he had a triple mission: to create revolutionary tension im . the United States; to help re-impose the Nkrumah dictatorship in Ghana; and to destroy Israel. On that day, too, I picked up my “copy of NATIONAL REVIEW (dated July _ 29) and read—with acute dismay— the editorial “Internationalize the Holy . City.” It struck me that the net result of all these statements would be the dismemberment of Israel, although the editors argued that such was not the case. e _ Nevertheless, the editorial treats lightly the historical facts—and the meaning of words. For instance, it says that “the Jordanian sector of Jerusalem [was] _ seized by Israel during the 1967 war.” The truth is Israel “seized” nothing as = _ that term is understood in law, custom —and morals. The facts are: Jordan seized Old Jerusalem in defiance of the original partition resolution establishing the state of Israel. The Jewish population was brutalized, hundreds killed; _ stables, tombstones into paving blocks. were synagogues were turned into The Israelis, naive in the ways of international hypocrisy in 1948, pledged to abide by the UN cease-fire resolution which got the Arabs off the hook they had fashioned for themselves when they . combined unsuccessfully to exterminate the fledgling Jewish state. When, however, Israel found its citizens under attack in June 1967—despite public and private persuasions to King Hussein to stay out of Nasser’s war—she struck _ back in self-defense—and in the processes of war reunited the city of Jerueo salem, affirming that never again would Israel permit its citizens to be humiliated by denying them the right to any 3 part of the Holy City, including wor_ ship at the West Wall. Further, Jerusalem has been capital of only one peo_ ple on this earth—the Jews. The Arabs never in all their history Jaid claim to _ it as either holy or secular city. Today it is the capital of a reborn Hebrew state. To internationalize it, as the editorial suggests, would be to profane it since it would invite the Soviet presence into the heart of the Holy Land. In any case, why internationalize only Jerusalem? Why not the entire Holy Land? Isn’t it all “sacred” to the three _religions—‘“Christian, Moslem and Jewish,” as the editorial says? Whatever it means to others, Jerusalem has special meaning for Jews. It is the city they pray to each morning; this is the city they are pledged never to forget; this is the city they wept for by the waters of Babylon. Tear Jerusalem out of Israel and you tear out its heart. At least that is the way the Israelis feel and they are prepared to the last man .- to defend it, but not in another Masada. Shall we say, Perish! Shall we say, either you abide by a UN resolution—something we ask no other nation to do—or we will exterminate you? The editorial does try to enlighten us by indulging in a bit of tortured mystagogy about the “Western Enlightenment” and what makes a nation “secular” or “sacred.” But this argument has little room in the real world, and no place at all in the atheist-dominated chambers of the United Nations. So we are back to the real question: How does one internationalize a city? The editorial proposes that the United Nations do it. Now if the UN sets up a committee of “neutrals”’—the editorial suggests a “religiously neutral” commission (whatever that is!)—the chances are it will be made up of men who are neutral on the matter of freedom and slavery. Chances are all such neutrals will have been screened by the “religiously neutral” representatives of Red Russia, although U Thant can be trusted to find a passel of anti-American (and anti-Israeli) neutrals from among the UN membership. Who would be the mayor of the internationalized Holy City? Chances are it would be—it would have to be—someone satisfactory to the regnant dictators in the Kremlin. To head up the distinguished Hebrew University, may choose—why Cleaver; and to direct the operations 0 Hadassah Hospital it may choose the commission not?—Eldridge Albanian acupuncturist or a doctor from Zanzibar. Why not? All this is not only possible, but A most inevitable, give or take a change of personnel here and there. It must be. stressed that the UN today is largely an instrumentality which serves the in terests of Soviet foreign policy. Nothing offensive to the Soviet Union can be adopted by the Security Council, Russia is not squeamish about using the veto, something it has done more than a hundred times. The United States is. still inhibited on this score. So that when it came to a vote of censure, the leaving the | vote 13-0 against Israel, thus helping United States abstained, to ward off a more damaging resolution which would have invoked eco- – nomic and military sanctions. ee EDITORIAL ENDS with a plea to Ambassador Yost to push for interna | tionalization of the Holy City at the | Yost may not listen. There is every hope that he understands that the problem is for Palestinians to solve and by Palestinians is meant all : the people on both sides of the River Christians, | the latter two among the most fiercely loyal to Israel as are the majority of Christians in many of the newly-occupied territories who, now for the first time in many years, feel some sense of security. $0 I, too, appeal to Mr. Yost: In the name of the peace we all desire, do not open” the hornet’s nest of international in – trigue in the Middle East by helping a UN. But Mr. Jordan—Jews, Moslems, Druzes and Bedouins, profane the Holy City by permitting & trance to the murderers of freedom i Europe—the fomenters hatreds—the state of Israel. of national sworn enemy of our country who is also the sworn enemy of : the best friend and ally of our nation | in the Mediterranean Mideast, .

MG

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Max Geltman

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ON THE MORNING of Wednesday July 23, 1969, Gamal Abdel Nasser reiterated for the ninety- : ninth time in twenty months that he regarded the cease-fire agreement be_ tween Israel and the belligerent Arab _ States as null and void. On the same day Eldridge Cleaver surfaced in AlI- – giers and joined his hosts in denounc_ ing America and Israel as enemies of mankind. In this he was echoed by _ Stokely Carmichael, also an honored _ guest at a cultural conclave in the land of Boumédienne, who topped Cleaver by declaring he had a triple mission: to create revolutionary tension im . the United States; to help re-impose the Nkrumah dictatorship in Ghana; and to destroy Israel. On that day, too, I picked up my “copy of NATIONAL REVIEW (dated July _ 29) and read—with acute dismay— the editorial “Internationalize the Holy . City.” It struck me that the net result of all these statements would be the dismemberment of Israel, although the editors argued that such was not the case. e _ Nevertheless, the editorial treats lightly the historical facts—and the meaning of words. For instance, it says that “the Jordanian sector of Jerusalem [was] _ seized by Israel during the 1967 war.” The truth is Israel “seized” nothing as = _ that term is understood in law, custom —and morals. The facts are: Jordan seized Old Jerusalem in defiance of the original partition resolution establishing the state of Israel. The Jewish population was brutalized, hundreds killed; _ stables, tombstones into paving blocks. were synagogues were turned into The Israelis, naive in the ways of international hypocrisy in 1948, pledged to abide by the UN cease-fire resolution which got the Arabs off the hook they had fashioned for themselves when they . combined unsuccessfully to exterminate the fledgling Jewish state. When, however, Israel found its citizens under attack in June 1967—despite public and private persuasions to King Hussein to stay out of Nasser’s war—she struck _ back in self-defense—and in the processes of war reunited the city of Jerueo salem, affirming that never again would Israel permit its citizens to be humiliated by denying them the right to any 3 part of the Holy City, including wor_ ship at the West Wall. Further, Jerusalem has been capital of only one peo_ ple on this earth—the Jews. The Arabs never in all their history Jaid claim to _ it as either holy or secular city. Today it is the capital of a reborn Hebrew state. To internationalize it, as the editorial suggests, would be to profane it since it would invite the Soviet presence into the heart of the Holy Land. In any case, why internationalize only Jerusalem? Why not the entire Holy Land? Isn’t it all “sacred” to the three _religions—‘“Christian, Moslem and Jewish,” as the editorial says? Whatever it means to others, Jerusalem has special meaning for Jews. It is the city they pray to each morning; this is the city they are pledged never to forget; this is the city they wept for by the waters of Babylon. Tear Jerusalem out of Israel and you tear out its heart. At least that is the way the Israelis feel and they are prepared to the last man .- to defend it, but not in another Masada. Shall we say, Perish! Shall we say, either you abide by a UN resolution—something we ask no other nation to do—or we will exterminate you? The editorial does try to enlighten us by indulging in a bit of tortured mystagogy about the “Western Enlightenment” and what makes a nation “secular” or “sacred.” But this argument has little room in the real world, and no place at all in the atheist-dominated chambers of the United Nations. So we are back to the real question: How does one internationalize a city? The editorial proposes that the United Nations do it. Now if the UN sets up a committee of “neutrals”’—the editorial suggests a “religiously neutral” commission (whatever that is!)—the chances are it will be made up of men who are neutral on the matter of freedom and slavery. Chances are all such neutrals will have been screened by the “religiously neutral” representatives of Red Russia, although U Thant can be trusted to find a passel of anti-American (and anti-Israeli) neutrals from among the UN membership. Who would be the mayor of the internationalized Holy City? Chances are it would be—it would have to be—someone satisfactory to the regnant dictators in the Kremlin. To head up the distinguished Hebrew University, may choose—why Cleaver; and to direct the operations 0 Hadassah Hospital it may choose the commission not?—Eldridge Albanian acupuncturist or a doctor from Zanzibar. Why not? All this is not only possible, but A most inevitable, give or take a change of personnel here and there. It must be. stressed that the UN today is largely an instrumentality which serves the in terests of Soviet foreign policy. Nothing offensive to the Soviet Union can be adopted by the Security Council, Russia is not squeamish about using the veto, something it has done more than a hundred times. The United States is. still inhibited on this score. So that when it came to a vote of censure, the leaving the | vote 13-0 against Israel, thus helping United States abstained, to ward off a more damaging resolution which would have invoked eco- – nomic and military sanctions. ee EDITORIAL ENDS with a plea to Ambassador Yost to push for interna | tionalization of the Holy City at the | Yost may not listen. There is every hope that he understands that the problem is for Palestinians to solve and by Palestinians is meant all : the people on both sides of the River Christians, | the latter two among the most fiercely loyal to Israel as are the majority of Christians in many of the newly-occupied territories who, now for the first time in many years, feel some sense of security. $0 I, too, appeal to Mr. Yost: In the name of the peace we all desire, do not open” the hornet’s nest of international in – trigue in the Middle East by helping a UN. But Mr. Jordan—Jews, Moslems, Druzes and Bedouins, profane the Holy City by permitting & trance to the murderers of freedom i Europe—the fomenters hatreds—the state of Israel. of national sworn enemy of our country who is also the sworn enemy of : the best friend and ally of our nation | in the Mediterranean Mideast, .