Focus on Arabs and Islam

Admiral Thomas H. Moorer, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff from 1971 to 1974 and Chief of Naval Operations from 1967 to 1970, has joined representatives of surviving crew members of the USS Liberty in calling for a Congressional Investigation into the June 8, 1967 attack on the U.S. Naval ship by Israeli aircraft and torpedo boats on the fourth day of the June, 1967, Arab-Israeli war.

In a dramatic and sometimes heated press conference held at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. by the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, Admiral Moorer told newsmen: "I just cannot accept the explanation that the attack was a case of mistaken identity. I know that it was impossible to mis-identify this ship. It was configured in such a way that it was unique ... Furthermore, the weather was very good and the sea was relatively calm with just enough wind to make the flag visible. The ship was flying the flag throughout. It was clearly marked with its name on the stern."

Asked if he saw any connection between the Pollard affair this year and the attack on the Liberty, in which 34 Americans were killed and 171 wounded 18 years earlier, the Admiral said the connection was the fact that after each Israeli apology, there has been no intensive U.S. investigation.

"I can't understand why Israel, which depends entirely upon the United States for financial, political, moral, economic and military support, would take such positions against the only nation in the world that makes Israel possible in the first place," Admiral Moorer said. "So I am particularly anxious to have all the facts associated with the attack on the Liberty made public.

"The Congress has never held a hearing of the nature and scope of the one that took place in connection with the attack on the Pueblo ...

When the Pueblo was seized by the North Koreans, I spent weeks over on the Hill testifying about the Pueblo in the most minute detail. But nothing like that's ever been done for the Liberty ... The difference in the way these two events were handled is mind boggling ... I think, without a doubt, that those 34 men who were killed on the Liberty were killed deliberately, on purpose, in a pre-conceived operation. I'll never believe until my dying day that it was a case of mistaken identity."

Stan White, chairman of the Liberty Survivors Association, told newsmen he was sending telegrams to the Secretary of Defense, Secretary of State, Attorney General, and Director of the FBI requesting an inquiry. White, of South Dakota, was a chief petty officer when the U.S. Navy ferret ship, outfitted with highly-sophisticated electronic listening equipment, was attacked in international waters about 23 miles off the Sinai coast.

"When that ship was attacked, it was machine gunned and it was rocketed," White said. "They also napalmed that ship. They've managed to keep napalm out of the records. They were loaded to put us under. I think we all want to know why it happened. We want to know why our government covered it up...Our purpose is to see that it never happens again."

Another former Liberty petty officer, Joseph Lentini, now an official of the Veterans' Administration in Washington, D.C., told newsmen: "There isn't a living member of that crew, I believe, who feels that ship was not meant to be sunk and any persons hitting the water alive would be shot. There's not one of us who believes that that was not the scenario that was planned."

James Ennes, deck officer on the Liberty at the time of the attack and author of Assault on the Liberty, a book describing both the attack and Ennes's subsequent investigations into its causes, told newsmen:

"When we came under attack, we got our message off immediately. The USS Saratoga launched aircraft to our assistance. And they were recalled. A retired admiral, who was on the Saratoga bridge as a captain, has told the press that he recalls hearing the Liberty radio operators calling frantically for help after the Saratoga's aircraft had been called back ... We want to know why were they called back."

The American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) is circulating to other organizations a statement calling for joint efforts to prevent the spread of terrorism into the United States. Citing three attacks on ADC offices in just over three months, which killed ADC Southern California Regional Director Alex Odeh, severely injured two Boston policemen, and caused extensive damage to ADC national headquarters in Washington, D.C., the statement declares that "Americans of Jewish or Arabic origin feel a special obligation to prevent this miasma from spreading. We would like instead to set an example of fraternity that may help to heal the tensions between our kindred in the Middle East."

The statement also welcomes "expressions of concern from the American Jewish Committee, International B'nai B'rith, Washington Jewish Community Council and by the New Jewish Agenda, as well as many Moslem and Christian groups and individuals" already received by ADC.

—Richard Curtiss

Focus on Jews and Israel

Last month, this column quoted the Washington Jewish Week's David Silverberg as saying the 54th General Assembly of the Council of Jewish Federations and Welfare Funds met November 12-17 in the national capital in a "time of unprecedented political strength for the Jewish community and a time of calm and cooperation in U.S.-Israeli relations."

Only four days after that meeting adjourned, Jonathan Jay Pollard, a 31–year-old American Jew working as a counterintelligence analyst for the Naval Investigative Service, was arrested Nov. 21 outside the Israeli Embassy in Washington, D.C. and charged with spying for Israel.

After the arrest of the young naval analyst—who was motivated, according to an internal Israeli investigation, by "zealous, pro-Israel sentiments" one can no longer describe relations between the two countries as "calm." Although the Pollard case has not necessarily weakened the American Jewish community, it has angered and worried many U.S. Jews, particularly those occupying sensitive security-related positions in government.

Jerusalem Post Washington correspondent Wolf Blitzer wrote in the Jewish Week that some senior Jewish officials employed at the White House, State Department, the Pentagon, and the Justice Department feel betrayed by Israel. He said they blame Israel for hiring Pollard and "reviving with a vengeance the old allegations of dual loyalty, which had in recent years largely been buried." Blitzer quoted one Justice Department official as predicting that the F.B.I. would now subject Jews applying for sensitive government positions to "stricter" background checks. A Defense Department official said the Pollard case had a "terrible effect on the morale of his Jewish friends in government, who now found themselves on the defensive."

While Jewish officials in government have expressed anger at Israel over the Pollard case, some American Jewish leaders appear to be making excuses for Pollard. Kenneth Bialkin, President of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, said that Pollard had not harmed U.S. security because the military secrets he sold mostly concerned "elements primarily of Israel's interest to defend itself—that is, information about the deployment of Arab forces and the nature of Arab strength." [Pollard allegedly provided Israel with documents about the armies of friendly Arab nations using U.S. weapons, such as Egypt, Jordan and Saudi Arabia.]

Jews throughout the country are anxiously awaiting the results of the U.S. investigation of the Pollard case, hoping that no more Jonathan Pollards come out of the woodwork.

In the nation's capital, meanwhile, Jewish organizations had to contend with another problem besides the Pollard case—the attack on the national headquarters of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC). Hyman Bookbinder, the American Jewish Committee's Washington representative, condemned the attack, saying that although he opposed what he called ADC's "anti-Israel views," he hoped the "criminals would be apprehended and punished severely."

While the ADC fire threatens to drive them further apart, an Israeli movie recently viewed by Washington area Jews and Arabs could help pull the two ethnic groups closer together. The film, Beyond the Walls concerns reconciliation between Jews and Palestinians in—of all places—an Israeli prison. Directed by Uri Barbash and written by his brother, Benny, both of whom are closely associated with the Peace Now movement in Israel, the film has reportedly been seen by one-sixth of the Israeli population and was also viewed by Knesset members.

Beyond the Walls was recently shown in two Washington locations. The American University Hillel sponsored one screening, which was followed by a discussion led by Yehuda Lukacs. Now studying for his doctorate in international relations at the university, Lukacs is a former Washington representative of Peace Now. The second screening was a benefit for the Peace Now Education Fund. Screenwriter Benny Barbash led the discussion following that showing. Barbash said he intended the movie to be a microcosm of Israeli society, and wanted to show that Israeli Jews and Arabs share a common destiny. In the film, Jewish "common criminals" and Arab political prisoners unite in a hunger strike to challenge prison authorities, who have played the two groups against one another to control the prison.

Beyond the Walls, nominated for Best Foreign Film at last year's Academy Awards, has not been shown regularly at commercial theaters in the U.S. Commenting on this in The Jewish Week, Ellen King implied that American Jews might have objected to the film because "it doesn't square with their idea of a just, democratic, Israeli society." However, many of the Jews who have seen it cite the fact that Beyond the Walls was made at all as evidence of the strength of Israeli democracy.

—Andrea Barron

Andrea Barron, a PhD Candidate in International Relations at the American University in Washington, D. C., is active in Washington Area Jews for an Israeli-Palestinian Peace and writes frequently about the Middle East.