Jewish Post, Indianapolis, Marion County, 31 March 1972 — Page 36

THE JEWISH POST AND OPINION

Friday, Marth 31, 1971

YOUNG JEWISH ACTIVISTS

Jewish Youth-Now A Whole New Ball Game

By ROSS KLEIN You see us waving our fists on the 10 o’clock news; you read about our latest escapades in the papers. We are cond e Hi n e d , underestimated, likened to the Maccabees and branded as renegades. Parents aren’t sure whether to rejoice at their children’s return to Judaism or bewail the radical form this return has taken; world governments, incensed by our activities, have nonetheless yielded to our demands. Who are we? What motivates us? IN THE SOVIET Union, in America, wherever young Jews live, a spontaneous surge toward Jewish identity has begun. More a movement than a well-structured organization, the return of a lost generation of Jews has led to a renewed concept of Jewish peoplehood, unity and introspection, and though often lacking direction or even a rational justification for its very existence, this movement — this stream of Jewish consciousness — continues to expand. Jewish youth have smashed the Iron Curtain and masterminded the most dramatic afiya in our history,

while in America they are chal1 e n g i n g a Jewish power structure whose priorities are symptomatic of a dying community, a community choking on its own affluence and superficiality. One need not search far for the reasons for the sudden rise of the Jewish activist phenomenon. The two most cataclysmic experiences in modern Jewish history — the Holocaust and the creation of the State of Israel — have affected Jewish youth deeply. Though we did not participate in either of those events, two other experiences that were actual consequences of those years did occur in our own lifetimes: “The Six-day War and the Soviet Jewry struggie. ,, BOTH EVENTS forced upon us the realization that, while we were the children of middle America, its values and lifestyle, we were also, quite literally, the children of the Holocaust. We, who had grown up with Israel as a reality, understood for the first time what it meant to be a Jew. Suddenly, we were more than Americans, more than rebellious youth in search of an

News Briefs: The Jewish High our School Student Alliance, a New saw York-based activist group, has

only announced the formation of a

Jewish Free High School, to be

alternative to the American that their religion was reac- while six million burned, and dream. Judaism became our tionary and their people a awed by the courage Jews their counter-culture and the Jewish plague on society. The end own age were exhibiting in the people became our people. result in both countries was the USSR, reacted similarly with a Those six days in June taught same; Jewish youth grew up vehement tenacity quite onus the empirical wisdom of the with a distorted vision of their familiar to the galut Jew.

Jewish experience: rely on no culture. Not surprisingly, we one but yourself. No country or were ashamed ot people would stand by Israel Jewishness and as it faced annihilation in those assimilation as our

crucial days before the war. recourse.

France, the most loyal ally The Six-Day War evoked modeled after the free univerIsrael ever had, cynically feelings within us that few sities established by students on realigned itself with those who believed existed in the con- the nation’s campuses. Classes threatened to push million sciousness of young Jews. As began on March 7, and will Jews into the sea. The super- a result of the emotions we cover such topics as Socialistpowers, if not actually abetting experienced, we began to Zionism, Holocaust literature the advocates of genocide, were reexamine our own concepts of and Hassidic Thought. The strangely reticent. Even the Judaism, and found that we had Alliance may be contacted at leftists and humanists, who had been lied to. 2061 Broadway, Room 507, New championed the cause of every Soviet Jewish youth, reacting York City . . Activi& groups oppressed people, viciously with the pent-up frustrations of are carefully watching the turned against Israel. Hie world 50 years of suppressed identity, situation in the Soviet Union to spoke by its silence, and the renounced their citizenship and see of the current lag in grantblatancy of its message was not openly identified themselves ing exit permits to Jews during lost on young Jews. with “the enemies of the State.” the month of February is TRUE, ALMOST an entire And throughout the world, their merely the result of red tape generation of Diaspora Jews counterparts, driven by the or indicative of a renewed had grown up without the shame of their parents’ inaction rigidity in government policy. benefit of any real Jewish

education to speak of. In

America, we were given the ethics of the middle class and told it was “Judaism.” In the USSR, the government was less subtle, and told its young Jews

Rabbi Shocked By Students Shoot First Is Not Jewish

MIAMI — When Rabbi Herbert Baumgard questioned the eighth grade class of his religious school on shooting a robber who had entered their home, he was taken aback at the answers be got. “We were surprised,” he wrote in his bulletin, “to note that the weight of thinking was that we should shoot sooner rather than later.” HE ADDED that a considerable number of the children “would shoot at the thief even if he hadn’t entered the house.”

Nixon Hails Detroit Paper ' DETROIT — What by many is considered the leading Jewish weekly in America celebrated its 30th birthday this week. President Nixon congratulated editor and publisher Philip Siomovitz on the milestone. “Your success is hailed not only by the Jewish community,” President Nixon wrote, “but by a nation that continues to benefit from the ideals, the values and the traditions that your perpetuate.” ISRAEL’S FIRST TOLL ROAD Work on Israel’s first toll road, which will run from Lod Airport to Abu Ghosh, will begin in June.

Rabbi Baumgard said their views emanated from “some ethic other than the Jewish ethic,” which he said was discussed by the Rabbis of old in the Talmud when a knife rather than a gun was the weapon. “The Rabbis were not ready to concede that the victim had the moral right to take the life of the thief . . . The Talmud suggests that a victim may not use force until every conceivable alternative has been used.” He said the Rabbis “seek to delay this moment indefinitely.” RETURNING TO the children, the Reform rabbi concludes that the ethic followed by them “is the ethic of the Hollywood cowboy. The heroism of the good guy is measured by his readiness to shoot it

out with the bad guy. This is not Judaism; it is good western, T.V. Americanism.” Continuing, he said: “There was also evidence of fear amongst our children. The onrushing crime wave has made them edgy. Everyone is taking to the gun, so perhaps, they had better also.”

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