Transplants

 

Just after the turn of the century, Shmuel received a notice of conscription to fight in the Russo-Japanese war. He and his family lived in Lagov, Poland. Deciding to evade the draft, he fled to Canada, leaving behind his wife Rayzel, two daughters, and an infant son.

After a number of years had gone by he returned to Poland and said, "Pack, Rayzele. You are coming to Canada." Rayzel, not wanting to leave her family and friends, objected "but where will we find a husband for Dvorele in such a strange land?"
"What do you think, Rayzele", her husband scoffed, "that it is a land of savages? There are there too, Jews."

The son, Chaim, was now ten years old and the younger daughter, a marriageable sixteen. An older daughter, herself a mother of several infants, stayed with her husband in Lagov.

Both youngsters were excited about removing to Canada; they had heard villagers referring to the country as the "Goldene Medina" - the land of gold. "And will we be able to pick up gold from the streets?" Chaim marvelled. His sister, though, thought of other matters, of young men more worldly than the ascetic Talmudists and timid tradesmen that inhabited Lagov.

The journey across the Atlantic was a joyless affair. They were forced to spend most of their time ill, in the cramped and poorly-ventilated steerage of the ship, along with other emigrants.

By European standards the family was a small one, and they soon found living space in Toronto with another family, in rented quarters. Shmuel, they discovered, had become a chicken peddler. He owned a horse and cart, and travelling on the perimeter of their new town, he visited a regular circuit of farming communities.

Before long other Lagovers emigrated to Canada. Some to Toronto, where they formed a Lagover Society, a group of people bonded together by a common past and an eager desire to succeed in the new country. From Poland they brought their concept of community life. Life revolved around the shul and the home.

After a few years had elapsed, Shmuel and Rayzel bought a house on Markham Street, just above Dundas Avenue, close to their shul. The house was red-brick, two- storied, attached to a twin, with a wide wooden porch. On the front lawn stood a huge old Catalpa tree; its long finger-shaped pods littered the lawn in the fall. Behind the house stood a roomy barn with a woodshed attached. "There we can keep the horse", Shmuel said to Rayzel. "And in the back you can make for me a vegetable garden", she breathed contentedly.

Chaim began accompanying Shmuel on peddling trips. He learned from his father how to befriend the farmers, how to assess the weight of poultry, how to inspect a flock for illness. By handling a suspicious-looking bird, Chaim learned to determine the manner of its illness and to cull it from the herd. He was shown how to crate the poultry for transport to the co-operative that disposed of the poultry. His father was a share-holder in the co-op, like others of his fellows. "When you learn, when you have your own wagon and route, I will buy you shares", Shmuel assured his son.

Soon a robust young man came calling on Dvore. Her parents had seen his face before at the shul, and friends attested as to his family background. A wedding was discussed.

"But I won't shave my hair off!" Dvore warned her parents. They turned shocked glances on Moishe, her fiance. But he spread his hands good-naturedly and said "here, in this country, it is not seen as an act of impiety".

Rayzele turned to her daughter. "You will shame your husband!"

"Mother", Dvore replied, "who will see me? - the cows?" For it was Moishe's aspiration to become a farmer, an occupation outlawed to Jews in Poland. And with the help of her parents, the young couple bought a farm near Kleinburg, Ontario, and there they began to raise their own family.

In time, apple-cheeked Dvore's hair turned gracefully grey, while her mother, with her deeply-lined face still wore the same brunette peruke.

"This Canada, this country, teaches Chaim bad ways", Rayzele wrung her hands. "V'ays mir!" For his part, Shmuel took more direct action, beating his son for his absences from home. "Hunt! I'm told you like to gamble! How is this, a son should stray so far from custom?" But the boy was growing up, he became fond of expensive clothes, developed a taste for hard liquor and began to avoid synagogue attendance. His absences were a cause for anxious gossip. Shmuel mumbled excuses.

Then a young woman arrived from Poland, with her sister and brother-in-law. The couple started a small kosher butcher business, living above their shop, and the young woman worked at a garment factory on Spadina Avenue.

It wasn't long before Chaim began spending more time at home. The old couple hoped that marriage would reform their wayward son.

"I want a place of my own", Sara said, soon after their marriage. "Your mother watches me all the time. I have no privacy. And anyway, we will need more room soon." Delighted with the news, Chaim rented a set of rooms at Kensington Market, just across the street from where he generally played pinochle, in the back room behind a delicatessen.

Now Shmuel and Rayzele lived alone, without any of their children. They rented out the whole upstairs and kept their front room for entertaining. Dark furniture glistened from constant polishing, and antimacassars lay on the arms of the sofa. When their daughter's children came to visit, they would enjoin them to "study and learn! With education comes everything", they told the children, convinced of the unlimited opportunities in this land.

Shmuel was now the 'Zayde' and Rayzele was the 'Bubbe' and so they were addressed by their grandchildren. The Zayde continued to go to shul every day, twice a day. And the Bubbe would prepare his tea in a glass with sugar cubes and sliced lemon, served with sugar cookies to refresh him. As his beard grew wispier and whiter, he continued to use a horse and wagon despite the growing use of motor vehicles. As the neighbourhood slowly changed, and a new flood of immigrants took the place of the old, she kept more and more to her house.

By correspondence the old couple learned that their older daughter lived now in Warsaw and her husband had a small mercantile business there. Their children were grown and had graduated from a gymnasia and the boys prepared to enter their father's business. They had felt no interest in emigrating to Canada at the urgings of the old people.

Then it was too late, and the war years permitted little concrete news outside Europe.

Despite that, Chaim worked hard, had bought a truck and developed his own chicken peddling route. Sara found it hard to make ends meet from the meagre dollars he rationed out to her. She often borrowed money from her sister, and her brother-in-law the butcher gave her meat from his store. Chaim refused to eat poultry. "I hate it", he growled. "I ate so much of it at my parents' house, I thought I'd grow feathers and cackle!" But the loans also became gifts; Sara could never manage to pay them back.

Sara never did learn that her husband visited his parents from time to time, whining that bills were due, that his wife over-extended the family's finances. The old couple kept giving their son temporary loans which were also never repaid.

Soon after the birth of her son, Sara took a factory sewing job, leaving the boy in the care of an old woman who lived downstairs in the same building. The old woman would chew up food with her hard gums, then place it in the little boy's mouth. "Eat, my little darling", she would croon to the infant. "Eat, my little orphan."

After a few years, the child, Itchele, learned the short route to his grandparents' home and from the time he was four, he came daily to stay with them, keeping them company. His mother was usually at work and when she was home, had no time for him. He had quickly sensed that Chaim had no use for him. "Out of my way!" was what he heard most commonly from his father.

Entering the house on Markham Street, the little boy would come across his grandmother rolling dough for egg-noodles in the kitchen. "Hi Bubbe", he'd kiss her and ask for his Zayde. She would indicate with her flour-covered hands the door leading to the cellar. On his way downstairs a disembodied voice floating upward would call "Itchoo, are you there?"

Itchele watched his Zayde shovel coal into the flaming mouth of the furnace. He'd watch the old man turn a spigot on one of the barrels lining a cellar wall. "Don't you do it, Itchoo, just watch Zayde". He'd watch his Zayde drain off a small amount of the bright liquid and 'test' it.

Zayde loved to dig in the backyard, to feel the lumpy dirt in his hands, and Itchele dug with him. Zayde enjoyed fresh radishes just pulled out of the dirt and Itchele, wrinkling his nose, tried to eat them too, but Zayde said fresh rhubarb sprinkled with sugar was better for little boys.

Rummaging around in the boxes of metal scraps in the shed, Itchele would hear the Zayde's horse banging about in its stall. "Itchele, be careful, sonele. Don't go behind the horse, no? He might kick you."

Sometimes the old man would encourage Itchele to take snuff from a small horn snuff box, its top pulled by a metal ring. "Take! Go ahead, like this - take a little bit - here on your hand." He would show Itchele how, saying "it's good to sneeze. It will help you to think better."

The boy went to shul with his grandfather and there the Zayde's landsmen, other old men with long wispy beards and gnarled hands, wearing capel and tallis, would playfully tease the child's cheek. "A sweet child!" They would ruffle their dry hands through his hair and offer him candy.

When the war came to an end, rumour became fact. The rubble of war yielded a relative handful of Jews; former inmates of death camps were removed to displaced-persons camps. There were long waits while enquiries poured in from all over the world; people searching for their relatives and friends.

The Bubbe and Zayde were told by the Jewish Agency that there remained one member of the older daughter's family; the youngest son.

At last, a tearful reunion. Of course, no one recognized anyone else. But Bubbe knew her daughter's son. "You look just like your mother", she said, leaning on the painfully gaunt young man, water welling from her sunken eyes.

The refugee came to live with the old couple, his grandparents, and Itche had to adjust to the idea that he had to share their attention. Bubbe was more demonstrative with the newcomer than anyone had ever seen her before. She stroked his poor thin face and asked him questions about his mother. He pleaded for patience; he wanted to forget his terrible ordeal first. She understood.

The young 'greenie' found a job in the shipping department of a clothing manufacturer. He paid room and board and bought little gifts for the family's children and the Bubbe. They lived this way for years, the young man slowly improving his position, learning English, establishing himself as a garment cutter with the clothing firm.

Once, Itche, soon to be bar-mitzvahed, was scrounging about in the scrap boxes in the cellar. He was alone, had earlier heard his father come into the Bubbe's house. For that reason, he lingered in the cellar, unwilling to go up until his father left. For the first time, Itche overheard his father saying "I need money."

"What for?" his grandfather replied. "We gave you money only last week. From where will we get so much money? We are old people!"

That evening the greenie told the old couple he was not really their daughter's son. He tried to explain to the incredulous old people that all their family had perished. Tried to talk beyond the anguish in their eyes.

"I met your grandson in Auschwitz. He died from starvation. We were part of a work crew." He told them in a barely audible voice that he had taken their grandson's identity and so had made contact with them through the Jewish Agency.

"I needed a sponsor, don't you see?" he begged. "I couldn't stay there any longer! I felt I was going crazy, don't you understand? I wanted a chance to live!" He told them he loved them, he would do anything for them.

Silent at first, her grey face stricken, the Bubbe succumbed to a new grief. The Zayde had compassion, would have forgiven, but the Bubbe would not be moved. She hated the young man now with the burning passion she had reserved for her family's slaughterers. Her shrieking curses followed him out the door of her house.

No one was allowed to speak his name again.

Life carried on. Their backs became more stooped, their chests hollow. Their voices faltered; they were less likely now to smile, to laugh.

At Itche's wedding the old couple walked haltingly down the aisle, leaning on each other, to sit before the wedding canopy. The Zayde cut the huge challah with his trembling hands and the tiny pieces were handed out traditionally, to all the guests.

When they could no longer look after their house, Itche drove them out to live on their daughter's farm. But because they were so frail, before long a family council decided they would be better off in a home for the aged. They were moved back to the city, where they shared a room in a huge new building that housed aged residents.

One of the daily newspapers in Toronto did a cover story on the old-age home. A big photograph of the Bubbe and the Zayde headed the story. Her head lay inclined toward his chest. His arm hung protectively over her shoulder. Her wig was no longer intact; her own, grey hair hung unrestained, a kerchief was tied jauntily under her chin.

In the picture, they were smiling.

 

Friends of a Friend

In her shabby living room; sitting, the four of them. Annette not meeting her eyes, refusing to answer her first whispered questions.

"Yeah, Mary - nice place you got here."

He looks like a cretin. Anything might look good to him. Who the hell is he? Just "This is Jack ... I've told you about him, and this is Armand". That's all Annette said; like that was all there was.

Grinning at her, this Armand. And ugly as a troglodyte. "Where's the kid? You got a kid, Annette said, where's he?"

Mutely, Mary pointed down the hallway.

Don't talk much, do ya? Okay, where's his father, the kid's father."

"I'm not married."

A sneer pasted itself on his face. "Yer not married! Just like that, eh? Imakulid konsepsion eh? Don't you got no morality?"

She flushed, shifted on the sofa. The idiotic grin remained plastered across his face.

"Got a good job, eh? She says, Annette, you got a good job, Parliament Hill. Big shot eh? You make good money?"

Forced herself to smile, answer civilly. "No. I'm just a steno. They don't pay us any more than they have to."

"Sure now? You sure ya don't get paid for anythin' else but typing and stuff? I bet you broads is all the same. All them big shots in politics're the same. Everyone's on the take! I heard about them chicks in the States - they don't get paid for typing. They shack up an' get on a candy payroll. You don't get any of that?"

He had to be kidding. She creased her face in the semblance of a wry smile at his little joke.

"Where ya from? Like I mean, not from Oddawa, eh?"

"Arnprior, I'm from Arnprior. My mother lives there, my whole family's there."

"Oh yeah? Hick town! Liddel girrul goes to the big town? Well, le'me tell ya, Oddawa's a hick town too, under all the federal crap. How 'bout comin' to Montreal, have a look around, eh?"

What appeared to be a normal conversation was going on between Annette and Jack. Beside her, the man with head bent toward her, waiting for a reply. Mary stood up, began to walk toward the hall.

"Where's she going?" Jack jerked his head sharply in her direction, asking Annette.

"Ask her" Annette said.

"I ... I'm going to see what my little boy is doing. He's playing in his room. He's quiet ... when they're quiet they're usually getting into trouble."

"The kid's quiet, leave him alone. We don't want any kid in here, making noise, yelling. I can't stand kids yelling. G'wan sit back down with Armand, he likes your company. Armand likes virgins. Talk to him, Virgin Mary."

"I left the washing machine going. I really should go see about that" she said, fumbling her fingers in her skirt. Jack looked at her again "don't be a bloody nuisance". His voice tight.

Nuisance? In her own house? Could she just say she'd had enough; Annette and her friends would have to leave. Would they?

Armand got up to pull the curtains aside. He stood back, looking out. "It's okay, Yves's back". Was that a gun, was that what she saw when his arm lifted?

Annette's brother; he had never been in her house before, but now he opened the front door without knocking, strode into the room, a parcel under one arm, a liquor bag in the other hand. Jack took the parcel, unwrapped it. He slipped the handgun into his waistband, slapped Yves on the back. "Now I feel better. More ... dressed, you know?"

Yves sat down, ran fingers through his hair. The three men laughing, almost rolling on the floor. The bottle half empty.

"Did'ja see that guy, the bald one, when I picked up the shotgun? See him run? that son-of-a-bitch! All them months him bugging my ass!"

"Yeah, all of them buggers ran like hell ... guards, Christ! I couldda did a better job! They just about crapped their pants and here we was worried it might not work!"

Turned to her. "How about something to eat? Hey, Virgin Mary, we're starved, what've you got?" Jack rose, stretched.

"Whatsa matter your friend, Annette? She sure don't say much" Armand observed.

"How about you girls go on in the kitchen and get us something to eat, hey?"

Stevie's voice, whining. He came down the hallway, his blanket held by the satin binding against his cheek, trailing on the floor. Right thumb stuck in his mouth, face flushed with sleep. Sleep and fever.

Eyes wide, he stood in the doorway. Looking not at her, but at the men. She stepped toward him, bent and picked him up, wiped the sleep from his eyes with the edge of the blanket.

"Stevie" she murmured, "had a good sleep? Feel better, Stevie?"

He ignored her, kept staring at the men; shifted his eyes to Annette, then back to the men. The men sat still for a moment, watching her and Stevie.

"I'm going to dress the baby" she said. "I'll be right back."

In Stevie's room, she pulled on his dressing gown, put his feet in his slippers. He kicked them off, hated to wear them.

"Who are they, Mummy?"

"Men, just men. Friends of Auntie Annette. And Stevie, you be a good boy, not to bother them. They're very busy and they don't have time for a little boy, all right?"

He wanted to flush the toilet himself. She made to pick him up again, but he insisted on walking.

Later, in the kitchen, she watched the men sitting on her old wooden chairs at the table, waiting for her to serve them their sausages and eggs. Almost out of coffee and milk. She watched, fascinated, repelled, as Armand lifted mounds of food to his mouth, spitting it out as he talked. When he caught her eye, she quickly looked away.

"What we need's some beer, eh?" Armand nudged Jack. "Y'got any beer?" he asked her.

"No."

"Zatso? Well, we gotta do something about that."

She walked up to Rideau Street, passing Mrs. Bronson. The old woman nodded, arms heavy with packages, trying to hold an umbrella. Another time, Mary would have helped her, walked back to the house next door to see the old woman home.

She had tried to sound casual. "Okay if I take Stevie with? He hasn't had a breath of fresh air all day." Annette had looked at her, disgusted.

Jack ignored her, but Armand snorted "Jus' like that, hah? You and the kid and then you'll come back with the beer and we'll all have a party, eh? Have some fun, eh?" He leered at her. "Some mother ya are! Ya said the kid's sick and here ya wanna take 'im out inna rain! Dincha know it's raining? 'Course we can't letcha take 'im out. It's raining! Even if yer a lousy mom, we'll look after the kid fer ya."

How could she walk so normally, she wondered, as though nothing was wrong? East on Rideau, toward the beer store. The pavement glittering, black, wet. Traffic heavy, windshield wipers clicking a steady staccato.

Across the street, a Green Hornet circling a car. Meter run out. If only .... What if someone was watching - Yves maybe? What if they were testing her? the parking control officer was young, looked like a kid. Dark glasses, he was intent on writing a ticket. A green Chevrolet.

She walked on, stopping before the store. Looked for a moment into its neat interior. A nightmare - she would soon wake up.

Mary going into the store. Mary carrying home a case for her friends.

 

On Being Jewish

 

Why the thumb-sucking introspection, the solemn navel-gazing which appears to leap at one from the pages of declaratory writings, of activity outlines, of goals and achievements? Why is it always so necessary for the writer (for his/her benefit or that of the pre-supposed readers) to declaim Jewishness? As though, by the very fact of being Jewish, there is a subtle (for most) unmistakable entree into the world of goodness, sensitivity, concerned activism, sterling achievements, scholasticism, modesty and intelligence. Is the fact of Jewishness tacitly acknowledged then, as the catalyst for particular sentience and achievement? Would the genetic imprinting and early environment of this person sans Jewishness not have resulted similarly?

Why is it that we metaphorically outline, underline, capitalize on, shout to the world, Jewish! Is it like a child's game proclaiming Head Start?

There's a kind of security blanket of comfort for most in 'belonging' to any group, for we are basically gregarious in character as biological organisms. We derive comfort from 'company'. Biologically we are also somewhat xenophobic. The comfort which we derive is not a bad thing in and of itself. Some individuals feel the need to delve completely into groups comprised of like individuals, all demonstrating (or professing to) similar tendencies. For others, it is merely enough to identify at a distance, taking some comfort from the satisfaction of knowing the group is there, and selecting one's 'contacts' with the focus on tribe being a secondary consideration to others perhaps more compelling in the context of modern society.

The deleterious component of this identification is the smugness involved in feeling oneself part of this 'distinguished' group, which excludes all others (unworthy) from the circle of its intimacy. The degree of smugness can range from a tiny inner feeling of being 'part of', all the way to overt symptoms of personality-elevation - social and moral superiority.

If one believes in old adages, behavioural precepts, morals and biblical injunctions, one should be aware that the Chosen People were a random choice scripturally selected to demonstrate to the world at large moral fibre and uprightness, consideration for the fellow man, and a willingness to live as one with all others.

True, the original goal was to diminish the ranks of those 'not chosen' (anyone outside the immediate tribe). Proselytization was soon recognized as being no means of achieving the goal, but example was. By the very goodness of their behaviour the tribe was meant to gradually impress upon all others its sterling mode of living and values until peace reigned through the prime observation of 'do unto others as you would have them do unto you'.

Someone, or some far-seeing group with an enhanced sense of universal responsibility and idealism must have reasoned that surely goodness would prevail eventually. The original precept, during the early cultural evolution of which we speak, was quickly subverted to reflect other, far less laudatory imperatives. We haven't come very far, since then.

If, however, the original precept was the unifying factor (however since translated) which held the tribe together, it is nothing short of amazing that these ancient precepts (subverted and often gone badly awry in many respects to be sure) still adhere. But the germ of the idea of 'chosen' and the moral responsibilities incumbent upon a people to render sterling example exists still, however subliminally, within the understanding and the psyche of the group. How much is due to the original purposeful catalyst and how much to intervening happenstance of history, encumbered by tradition, culture, social awareness and an 'idea' of a common root, is a moot point. History and culture remain, of course, the unifying ingredient.

Which brings me right back to my original query... One feels intrinsically 'special' as a Jew. With no affiliations to specific Jewish organizations, no religious acknowledgement, adherence to custom or anything remotely (on the surface, in any event) unifying, one has this gift of existence and it is generally perceived to be very precious indeed. And if one feels that to carry the gift with one honourably one must obey the original injunctions to the best of one's ability, all the better; we have, doubtless, a better human being. Surely not at all better than a Muslim, a Protestant, a Buddhist, a Catholic with similar sensibilities however derived, but a better person withal.

So why insistence on overt identification? All too often one's name, facial features, manner of address, proclaim all too clearly to the world the obvious; why trumpet it out additionally, if not for the purpose of raising the barriers of sensitivity. To ensure the world knows with a certainty that one is proud, unique, and has few equals outside the tribe? Why not be assured the goal at onset can be achieved without diminishing the value of others? It seems obvious that this critical redundancy continues through an errant sense of arrogance, a self-perceived group superiority.

And it is just quite possible that such a distinction has become a great aid at times of need, a comprehensive assurance to one's self that the world outside the tribe which has rejected The Jew -- at times culturally and socially dismissively, and on other occasions with ferocious group violence -- selectively seen as an outlier in any mainstream society where the diaspora has taken them, is a mode of defiance, a declaration of 'We're here -- deal with it!!' And they do.

The Ottawa Gathering

An unique happening took place in Ottawa from April 28th to the 30th, 1985, marking the fortieth anniversary of the liberation of Nazi Germany's infamous death camps. This momentous occasion, the first of its kind in Canada, was produced under the auspices of the Canadian Jewish Congress in recognition of the 40th anniversary of the Liberation. The Canadian Gathering of Jewish Holocaust Survivors - and Their Children was meant to be a recognition of the unforgettable, a re-affirmation of the tenacity of individual endurance and collective memory, and a shout to the world that such events can and have happened and that we must all pledge ourselves to ensure that this may never ever happen again.

The only way in which we can be certain that such a cataclysmic horror would never again occur, it is recognized, is to evoke the memory, and with it the pain, of the past. The memory and the pain must never be permitted to dull with the passage of time. Like a precious object, this jewel of our anguish must come to the public light time and again and the facets of its many dimensions polished by whatever means at our disposal to shine the ineffable light of truth and justice in the eyes of the unbelievers.

The Gathering began on a rainy Sunday in this capital city of Canada. About two thousand Jews gathered to celebrate memory and perseverance and to honour the dead. A two-hour remembrance ceremony evoking the past and honouring those who survived began on Parliament Hill and proceeded from there to the War Memorial where wreaths were laid in recognition of Jewish soldiers who fought alongside their peers in Germany.

Without doubt Elie Wiesel was the eloquent luminary of this opening session and the passion of his words kindled both fears and resolve in the hearts of his listeners. Six death camp survivors lit torches from the Eternal Flame burning before the Centre Block of Parliament in commemoration of the six million who perished in the agony of the Holocaust. They were assisted by children of survivors, and the symbolism of the ceremony could have been lost on no one.

The Gathering was meant to provide a forum from which those who attended (and those many who were there in spirit but at a remove, reading the reports in their daily newspaper) could experience a manner of re-dedication, where all could derive sustenance from the proceedings and one another, and be energized and re-imbued with the will to continue the struggle for recognition and for justice and above all, for assurance that truly never again could such a dreadful tragedy occur.

The theme of the Gathering actually summed up its purpose: "From Awareness to Action". this is hardly to say that those who attended were not acutely aware in every fibre of their being. Many, however, resonated a kind of painfully individualistic awareness, that of a wound refusing to heal and in some manner perceived by the self to be a shameful wound to be hidden. Through the forum of the Gathering and the opportunities which it presented to meet with others, to discuss through halting and then strengthening purpose of dialogue, it became possible to relinquish and bury for all time the sense of personal shame. Pride replaced the covert injury, and people embraced both physically and metaphorically in a union of shared grief and understanding bolstered by the determination to influence all people of good will in the struggle for world peace through understanding.

While there as a participant, as an onlooker, as someone who intended to report on the proceedings, it was possible to be at one and the same time involved and detached. The detached part of me wrote down ceaselessly every impression, every observation articulated by the speakers, and each summation of the workshops. The involved part kept recalling how, as a child, my father never tried to 'protect' me from the realities of existence as a Jew - kept recalling the words of the song Zog nit Kainmohl - kept recalling the volumes devoured detailing the savage activities of the fascist Third Reich. And too I remembered tattered sepia prints and one in particular of a young man with a moustache who was my father's older brother who, like all my father's other relatives and my mother's, were slaughtered.

I remembered too my shock as a child on encountering another young girl in the cloakroom of our classroom at school forty years ago and this weeping child was bemoaning the cruel fact that she was born Jewish. How anyone could deny their Jewishness was beyond me, then as now. And the thousands of people who came out to Ottawa for the Gathering were there not in mourning as much as in proud affirmation of their Jewishness which has blossomed throughout the millennia despite unspeakable persecutions, and has never diminished to this day.

But the true value of such a gathering is not so immediately perceived. It is later, re-thinking the event, one's exposure to passionate, brilliant speakers; the milling crowds where on occasion one soul finally meets another after a long separation; the poignant riffling of faded photographs from another, now vanished world in a sandbox-like display; of the mutely beseeching baby shoes, the tattered remnants of clothing in another display; the proud affirmation of strength in the contemporary sculpture illustrating the mother-figure in fierce protection of the young. These are all emotion-laden images, designed to evoke the gut response that they did, and in the end, recall the onlooker to his future through the past.

On Monday, April 29th, thousands of Jews gathered in the huge Main Hall of the Ottawa Congress Centre for the opening Forum on Hate Propaganda. Chairman Les Scheininger (Canadian Jewish Congress, Ontario Region) reminded the gathering that they were all duty-bound to eradicate any fomentation against minorities, any kind of racism or discrimination against those pinpointed in some way as being 'different'. And he reminded the audience in the words of Emil Fackenheim that the Holocaust was no war, but a deliberate plan to eradicate a group made unpopular by a public appeal to the ugliest emotion in human nature. And, he went on, Jews are a living monument of what humanity can aspire to; dignity of existence, tolerance for all ... that racism is a virulent pestilence which has the capacity to destroy all that is civil in man and society.

Manuel Pritschi (National Director, Community Relations, C.J.C.) spoke on Holocaust Denial. The term 'holocaust' itself having been coined to describe the deliberate and systematic destruction of European Jewry. Denial, he maintained, was the point at which Nazism and neo-Nazism converge; denial is an unabashed attempt to rehabilitate the Third Reich. The process of denial is to excel in the perversion of language; semantic athleticism whose end result is a kind of sordid doubt of the undoubted, by focusing on absurd innuendo to shift attention away from reality, by declaring incriminating documents to be forgeries, by total illogicality of the argumentative process. The complete dissolution of logic; a desecration of truth and the memory of the victims, and of democracy.

Alan Shefman (National Director, Field Services, League for Human rights, B'nai B'rith) who assisted during the Zundel trial) explained that to understand denial one must try to understand Hitler - looking to the history of Genghis Khan as a great conqueror and that history would handily 'forget' mass atrocities and recall only the romanticism of the conqueror. And the way to deal with these impossible historical slurs is to seek recourse in law to battle libel, racist defamation, and the contempt of ethnic and other minorities. Western democracies have enacted laws to deal with hate propaganda, but incredibly the United States has no such laws. Canada has responded with such a law as a result of Alberta's Keegstra affair. We must challenge by any means possible through the media, to the general public, the courts, any such re-writing of history. The Zundel trial and its accompanying publicity, Shefman maintained, did more to undermine denial theory than any previous attempts. Each such success is a major impediment to Nazi rehabilitation.

Dr. Irving Abella (Professor, Glendon College, York University), co-author of None is Too Many, pointed out that the serenity of the myth of Canada being a home for the needy, the immigrant, was punctured irremediably by historical fact-finding. That Canadian immigration authorities did everything within their powers to keep Jews before, during and after the Second World War from entering Canada. Immigrants from any other background were preferred, no matter their political affiliation, no matter how suspect their past. And these barriers were erected to keep out Jews, Blacks and Asians, those most despised members of the human race, those traditionally most in need of succour.

He spoke of the many heart-rending letters from European Jews pleading for admission to Canada, contained in the Public Archives of Canada - our national shame. Jews simply did not fit into the public concept of 'what a Canadian should be'. Jews were seen as urbanites, not loggers, farmers, fisherfolk; Canadians feared the impending possibility of a 'Jewish invasion' and hence no Jews, not even Jewish orphan refugees were welcome and were sent instead to their deaths. Lies that go unchallenged, Abella reminded the audience, may become public policy - and silence is mistaken for acquiescence. Distortion of truth, and of history creates the atmosphere for future disasters.

Following the Plenary Session of the opening forum, Bernard Ostry (Deputy Minister, Ministry of Citizenship and Culture, Province of Ontario) chaired the forum "Holocaust Denial on Trial: Marshalling the Evidence". Ostry reiterated the need for vigilance, for everyone to be involved to ensure that history would not be rewritten. Yet we must see ourselves as neither avengers nor victims. Those who portray themselves as victims tend to be treated as victims. Our search is for Justice; that is a universal, never-ending preoccupation.

Serge Klarsfeld (President, Association des filles et Fils des deportes juifs de France, Paris, France) spoke of his and his wife Beate's activities in tracking down Klaus Barbie and their struggle to uncover unacceptable evidence which would be recognized by a court of justice to bring Barbie to trial and finally, to justice. He described how, at one point in their joint activities, the prosecution was merely a symbolic act as no one really knew where Barbie was - and then went on to describe the slow methodical tracking down of the war criminal and his eventual deportation to France where he now awaits trial. The successful search and location of a key document, the original telex in the Archives of the International Court of Justice, used in the Nuremberg trials, presented the final irrefutable evidence in the case against Barbie.

Robert Menkes, a doctoral student in Jewish history, Brandeis University, reminded the gathering that once survivors are no longer with us, Holocaust deniers will become more bold and more vocal. History, he asserted, provides the ammunition to bring the truth to light through the rational and methodical work of documentation by accredited historians. Yet revisionists like Faurisson and Keegstra and Zundel should be taken seriously as it is necessary to familiarize oneself with their theories to be able to adequately refute them. One must bear witness as one can, but always with dignity and commitment.

Sol Littman (Simon Wiesenthal Centre, Canada) spoke on "Searching out Canada's War Criminals; The Rauca Case" and reminded the audience that Canada was a major haven for war criminals, and has been since 1945. Despite this, only one extradition took place, that of Helmut Rauca. Rauca 'disappeared' in 1945 and 'reappeared' again in 1982, living in obscurity in a 35% Jewish suburb of Toronto. Currently, war criminals and collaborators of Yugoslavian, Ukrainian, Estonian, Latvian, Slovakian and Hungarian background are experiencing a sense of disquietude, for there will be additional cases of actions against criminals and criminal collaborators. There will, certainly, be a movement to derail the momentum in war crimes prosecutions, but we all must make an effort to keep this particular struggle alive.

In between the workshops there was opportunity to view films such as The Revolt of Job, Breaking the Silence, Raoul Wallenburg - Buried Alive, Charlie Grant's War, and Genocide. I managed to view the film Breaking the Silence which focused on Holocaust survivors and their relationship with their families, primarily their children. The anguish of the parents is writ large on the psyche of the children.

Parents are exceedingly reluctant to speak to their children of their death camp experiences. Much resentment and bitterness erupted between the generations because of this lack of communication ... the parents desperately wanting to shield their children from knowledge of their unspeakable experiences ... the children badly wanting to know of their parents' experiences, wanting to help in their own way to diminish their parents' grief. Through a gradual breaking down of the barriers of silence, understanding and a keener appreciation of the needs of one another is finally expressed.

In actual fact, however, there never really was time to do or see everything. The forums and films and other activities were congruent one upon the other. One had of necessity to scrutinize the program and try to arrive at an intelligent deliberation.

Finally, the words of Professor Irwin Cotler (Professor of Law, McGill University, Montreal) placed the whole matter in a cogent perspective. There are things in Jewish history too terrible to be believed - but they were not too terrible to have happened. Elie Wiesel told us that "Not all victims were Jews, but all Jews were victims". There are no words sufficient to describe the horrors of the Holocaust. Yet Canada was the world forum of denial of the existence of the Holocaust [i.e, the Zundel and Keegstra trials - Ed.]. The anti-human description of Jews, and the wide acceptance of those calumnies paved the way for the Holocaust.

(President Ronald) Reagan equated the suffering of the victims with the suffering of the oppressors prior to his Bitburg wreath-laying; an obscene and immoral observation. The uniqueness of the Holocaust has an especial resonance; the Holocaust could never have occurred without the silent acquiescence of the world. The crime of indifference led to the success of the Holocaust. But the work of a handful of righteous people gave mankind back its dignity. In a world which is not safe for Jews, there is no safety for the existence of democracy. It is the survivors who have redeemed humanity by their very existence. We have learned not to despair, for that would be a denial of Jewish future.

Dr. Victor Goldbloom (President, Canadian and International Council of Christians and Jews, Toronto) should perhaps have the last word in this report. He said that, to commemorate is to mourn - and to teach. We face the challenge of communicating with a new generation. It would represent a compounded tragedy after the Holocaust if nothing had changed. We must be the conscience of the world and work to make the world "more human". We must strive to work with people of good will with respect and harmony and good faith. We must work together forthrightly and with humility, patience and an open mind. To this we must all dedicate ourselves.

 

The Poet As The Voice of Conscience

"And indeed the success ... of civilization continues to depend upon the practice of virtue identified with civility." Rene Dubos

The July 8, 1979 'New York Times Magazine' featured a rather interesting article on American writer John Gardner. Gardner's basic thesis as a writer of prose regarding the place of literature in society, and as a writer of fiction himself, is that the writer must recognize his responsibility to the society in which he lives. In other words, the writer has a duty not merely to hold up a mirror of words to society in which he skilfully paints a picture of modern society and all its various manifestations, but he must paint that picture of words to illustrate man's moral imperatives. Gardner states: "Real art creates myths a society can live with instead of die by, and clearly our society is in need of such myths..."; and, "Moral fiction holds up models of decent behaviour: Characters whose basic goodness and struggle against confusion, error and evil - in themselves and others - give firm intellectual and emotional support to our own struggles."

Surely, few can argue with such purpose in writing. To demonstrate man's struggle against the conditions of society imposed on him, against the Hyde and Jekyll residing in the psyche of each one of us is a noble tradition in writing. Maxim Gorky, Isaac Babel, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Charles Dickens, Emile Zola and Thomas Hardy, to name but a few writers of especial note who penned their mirrors during post-industrial man's crisis of experience, did such a service for their readers, and ultimately, humanity.

Social Anthropologist Rene Dubos writes in his Beast or Angel?: "Whether or not the words altruism and love had equivalents in the languages of the Stone Age, the social attitudes which they denote existed". From time immemorial, man has had imprinted in his inherent genetic code the need to be a social creature. This need is complemented by the capacity to love, to feel responsibility one for the other. Our animal origins have also predisposed us to answer the imperative of self-preservation; the most basic of all life-form responsibilities. What makes humans different qualitatively from other animal forms is our very humanness, our tacit recognition that our very existence is inextricably tied to that of the others with whom we share this globe. Our responsibility is not only to perpetuate our own lives, but that of other humans. And when we note injustice and moral decay it is likewise our responsibility to recognize the need to right the matter, if only by publicizing it, by bringing it to the attention of society. Man makes the conscious choice between behaviour which is basically 'good' for humanity and that which is inimical to its humane existence.

It is for that reason that Gardner's position rises above that of pious censure of his literary contemporaries; the writer does have a duty to illustrate, sometimes graphically, the ills which exist in this world; does have the linguistic and imagistic dexterity to move people and benefit society. By simply writing a tale of things as they appear to be on the surface and leaving it at that, by not insisting that the reader make a moral judgement, the writer abrogates his/her own moral responsibility.

There is that about the writing of fiction though, which permits this shrugging off of responsibility. After all, the fiction writer is often merely a teller-of-tales and fiction becomes a type of escapism where one can indulge in vicarious adventures. There is, however, that about the writing of poetics which does not permit the easy way out. The poet, throughout written history and before that, oral history, has taken upon him/herself the mantle of prophet, philosopher, historian and moralist. It is a heavy responsibility, but were it not for the poetic legacy humanity has had gifted it by that segment of any population which felt itself morally responsible to the majority, then humanity would be much the poorer today.

According to the basic tenet of the Persian prophet Zarathustra, more than two and a half millennia ago: "That nature only is good which shall not do unto another whatever is not good unto its own self." The Golden rule of 'Do Unto Others' is an ancient one, much pre-dating the advent of Christianity. And from ancient Sumer, inscribed on clay comes this text of a father's unhappiness with his son's material success because: "I, night and day, am tortured because of you...because you looked not to your humanity."

It was no mere literary caprice that caused Thomas Hardy to belittle to himself his fiction and wish instead to be known as a poet. He understood the power of the poet. Understood too, that although fiction is capable of holding up to the viewer a mirror of society's foibles and predilections, felicitous and unhappy, it is poetry which demonstrates by its subtle interweaving of perceptions and expectations - Man As He Should Be - that it is the bellwether of change. The poetic voice mothers us, encourages us; it entices us and finally it thunders, arousing emotions, demanding an accounting of our actions.

When Homer wrote: "Sing, goddess, of the cursed wrath of Achilles, Peleus' son, that brought to the Achaeans immeasurable suffering, and hurled away to Hades many mighty souls of heroes", he was articulating, in another way, what Zarathustra after him wrote; that we are our brothers' keepers and ultimately responsible. When Sappho wrote: "Some say that the most beautiful thing on the black earth is an army of horsemen, others an army of foot-soldiers, others a fleet of ships; but I say it is the person you love", she too was illustrating the recognition of moral values. And when Euripides wrote: "Have no grudge against me, spectators, if, although poor, I speak before the Athenian people about the city, and make a comedy of it. For even comedy knows what is right, and I shall tell things terrible but just", he was exercising his poetic responsibility.

That responsibility is both a terrible and a beautiful exercise in civility. To be civil is to interact responsibly with one's fellow man. (In his Dictionnaire francois-latin published in 1549, Robert Etienne defined civilite [civility] by the charming phrase "qui scait bien son entregent [who knows how to deal pleasantly with other people])". As social creatures the genus of man exercises the option, individually and collectively, to be part of a fundamentally sound whole. But there are times and isolated instances in history when this fundamental wholeness or wholesomeness fails, when, on a large or a small scale, society's humanism breaks down. It is the frightening responsibility then, of the poet to remind society through his insight and his skillful deployment of words, to bring society back to its collective humanity.

Human beings are heir to despair, yes, but we are also the legislators of our own despair and we have the means by which we can transform despair to a kind of victory of the soul. The poet, throughout antiquity and up to the present era, in the words of Ruth Wildes Schuler expresses options: "He is the torch-bearer that must search for the essence to redeem man. He must make it 'all come right'. He has a duty to duel with the destructive forces. He cannot conquer death, but he can express rage at man's abuse of helpless animals, the destruction of our natural environment and the inhumanity of man to other men, whether through prejudice or war."

The poet, then, throughout history has always been the catalyst for the transcendence of the animal in us all; the poet will continue to be the catalyst for the recognition of humanity in us all.

 

 

 

Food and Fertility

There is an old adage that the chronically indigent are efficient breeders. Good for nothing else, society often sneered. But it would appear that they bred, not because they wanted to, necessarily. Man is a normally heterosexual creature and the act of sex is as much an emotional comfort and release as it is pure sensual pleasure. In all likelihood, the poor of any population do not engage in sexual activities resulting in many pregnancies any more than do the upper stratum of society - with deliberation.

Nor do they engage in more frequent sexual activity than their more affluent counterparts for cheap recreation. The answer to the fecundity of the poor is not to be found in the explanation that so few infants survive in slum conditions due to poor nutrition and inadequate hygienic conditions; nor are they bred merely to have a few survive. Nor is it the compulsion of the poor to procreate in order to raise to adulthood children who will then feel a compulsion to look after their poor old parents in old age.

The reason for fecundity among the world's poor populations is probably linked to the type of diet available to those same indigent populations. It is as simple as observing the physical or physiological proportions of low-income people. Invariably, there appears to be a preponderance of fat people among such populations. At least, the marginally under-privileged.

As, for example, people living in crowded urban centres. There, men and women are often unhealthily obese and so are their children. The obesity is no indication of having lived and eaten well, but rather it is an indication of malnourishment. Malnourishment in that these urban poor tend to purchase cheap food, mainly carbohydrates. A lack of nutritive value, but often, quick calories which satisfy the pangs of hunger while doing little to maintain good physical health.

Studies recently carried out on menstrual cycles have shed some light on the physiological mechanisms involved in lowering the fertility of lactating women. Although women themselves have traditionally nursed their young as long as possible, feeling by experience, that by so doing, they would remain immune to further impregnation, medical science has been known in the past to hold the unspoken and unwritten theory at arm's length.

But these were no mere old wives' tales. These wives knew whereof they practised. It was more than mere theory that kept lactating women from another pregnancy; yet another unwanted pregnancy. Menstruation took its time resuming when a woman was nursing and as long as ovulation was kept at bay women felt safe with good reason, although the reason may have been unknown to them.

It now appears that a certain percentage of female body weight in fat must be reached before a woman will be ready to resume ovulation following pregnancy and delivery. There is an estimate of 20 to 25 percent of body fat as a critical threshold before a mechanism is triggered to resume menstruation. The estimated average energy package necessary to meet the needs of a pregnancy is set at about 27,000 calories. This amount of calories must be stored as body fat, generally speaking, before the biological mechanisms are set in motion to induce menstruation with a view to egg fertilization. And the 27,000 calories are just about what a pregnancy brought to term costs in caloric value.

It becomes quite difficult, under normal conditions, for a lactating female to store this critical threshold of stored fat while she is nursing. A nursing infant takes around 1,000 calories from its mother each day, thus making it difficult to reserve the necessary calories toward that vital build-up for menstruation to take place. And as long as the infant is dependent on its mother for milk, or as long as the mother wishes her child to remain dependent on her nursing output, she has good reason to believe she is 'safe' from pregnancy. Ovulation resumes gradually once the mother removes her nursing child from daily milk nourishment at her breast - once her physical state reaches its norm of fat storage for a fertile female.

In countries where females put on body weight at an early age, menarche, or early menstruation, is most common. In societies where female nourishment is of a leaner variety, where women tend to be lean physiologically, menarche is retarded by as much as five years.

In our relatively well-nourished female populations on the North American and European continents, menarche takes place at around thirteen years of age, whereas in chronically diet-deficient populations it takes considerably longer for the female population to build up the necessary fat reserves to become sexually mature.

The contradiction here, is that it takes a high protein diet to successfully permit a woman to nurse her infant for a prolonged period of time and at the same time maintain her own body vigour and flow of milk. And if the same woman is placed on a high carbohydrate diet she puts on too much weight too rapidly, thus triggering the resumption of ovulation - while at the same time the infant she nurses is deprived of sound nutrition since on the high carbohydrate diet, the nursing mother is, as well.

However, it has been discovered that high protein diets, those same diets which are available generally only to those enjoying a high income, are also responsible for low fertility rates. Conversely, high carbohydrate diets, those most commonly connected with low-income people, are responsible for high fertility rates.

A recent study demonstrated that nursing mothers from underdeveloped countries where the diet consisted in large part of starchy grains and root crops, were unable to extend the period between births to any appreciable extent. On the other hand, nursing Bushman women, whose diet is rich in animal and plant proteins, manage to avoid pregnancies for four or more years between each birth.

What this points to is that as populations increase and the demands on the quality of food supplies outstrip the capacity to produce, and poorer quality of food replaces the more nutritionally viable foods, populations tend to increase, rather than decrease. This is an obviously vicious spiral since, with food in shorter supply, less protein is available to a greater proportion of a population. The population for whom the nutritionally-poor carbohydrates in the form of root crops and starch-based foods form the basis of their intake, tend then to produce a greater fertility rate; thus further straining the food supply.

In the past, many societies have incorporated into their culture means by which their populations could be controlled when the food supply was threatened by more mouths than it could be expected to feed. The most common means of control were infanticide, geronticide and induced abortions. Women would be induced to abort by means chemical or mechanical, utilizing herbicides and sometimes means as brutal as the laying of a board across the pregnant woman's middle and applying weight until blood spurted from the vagina. While effectively doing away with the foetus, this type of treatment was also inimical to the expectant mother.

And, to illustrate a society which practised infanticide and geronticide, we can look to the Inuit who were wont to expose female babies to a harsh environment and whose elderly (given the lengthier life expectancy of females and their shorter perceived 'usefulness', doubtless these were mostly women) were expected to practise voluntarily, a type of passive suicide by exposing themselves, unprotected, to the elements.

Infanticide in various societies took many forms, from actively inducing death to benign neglect. Whatever the method, the purpose was the same; population control ... and traditionally the female of the species by nature of her biology was the sacrificial lamb.

With the above information, it becomes increasingly evident that population growth stability does become a more vital necessity than had been previously thought. For it is imperative not only to feed greater populations, but in our own defence, with a world population nudging four billion, to properly feed these populations in the hopes of staving off a prodigious upswing in fertility.

The poor, it would appear, do indeed breed prolifically. But not because they plan to; not because it is their only free recreation, but because nature appears to have an extremely capricious sense of humour.

 

The Neglected Tribe

Operation Moses, the furtive airlift of Ethiopian Jews from refugee camps in the Sudan, took place during November and December of 1984. It brought approximately 7,000 Ethiopian Jews into Israel, many of them harbouring tropical viruses, many in severely emaciated condition, but all overjoyed to walk upon the soil which they considered sacred.

When these people finally arrived in Israel from their overcrowded refugee camps, most went through a careful screening process to make certain that they were Jews, and not Christian Ethiopians. Those who could prove they were Jews were proffered immigration cards; their identity cards would only be awarded when they 'renewed their Judaism', the women by ritual immersion in the mikvah, the men through a re-enactment of circumcision, although they were already circumcised. The Israeli government contended that these rites were necessary as a result of the Ethiopians' "significant isolation from Judaism and the Jewish world for hundreds of years". Those 'unfortunates' discovered to be Christian Ethiopians were spared this humiliation, and given temporary visas, then sent to work on kibbutzim.

The most immediate problem of re-settlement was health; doctors were faced with infectious diseases they'd previously only known through their medical textbooks, including malaria, typhoid, jaundice and widespread malnutrition.

These thousands joined a like number of Ethiopian Jews whose slow migration had begun twenty-five years earlier. During that period, a mere trickle of Ethiopian Jews had pulsed into the country, aided by Jewish welfare groups. Later, associations were set up for rescue - and finally, bit by bit, a kind of underground railroad was established by the Israeli government itself.

The Action Committee for Ethiopian Jews had been pleading with the Israeli government for years to act more decisively to negotiate with the Ethiopian government to re-unify families and to bring in greater numbers of Ethiopians from their severely underprivileged environment. Governmental inaction resulted in suicides of despair, with some Beta Israel threatening suicide by immolation before the Israeli Parliament in a last desperate effort to embarrass the government into action.

Who are these dark-skinned Africans who proudly wear the mantle of Judaism? They're familiarly known as Falashas, an Amharic term denoting 'strangers'. But Ethiopian Jews consider themselves denigrated by this, as indeed, the word in Amharic is meant to convey 'outcast'. These black Jews call themselves Beta Israel. The House of Israel; indicative of the pride in their Jewish identity, their biblical descent from Solomon, their adherence to ancient religious rites, and faithfulness against all adversity. They have been ritually scorned, publicly stoned, and officially neglected, in Ethiopia.

This is also a people lost in time, an iron-age still-life, a once-isolated group convinced that they represent the only Jews on earth, the only remnants of a once-numerous tribe. Legend had it that they were one of the ten lost tribes of Israel.

Ethiopian Jews fervently believe their genesis was a bright amour between King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba, the beautiful Abyssinian Princess Makeda, which produced a son, whom Queen Sheba had sent as a child to Solomon to receive his education. His father returned him eventually as a young man, purportedly with the Tablets of the Law of Moses. This son, Menelik I, later ruled Abyssinia.

Although as a group the Ethiopian Jews of this era are largely illiterate, unskilled and desperately poor, in the historical past they were influential and of the ruling class. Several civil wars disrupted the ruling hierarchy and other groups entered the ascendancy. So for past centuries, the Beta Israel have lived alongside other Ethiopians in miserable poverty, practising such lower-class occupations as pottery and iron-mongering. They have lived mostly in Gondar Province, and in Tigre, in northern Ethiopia, among their neighbours, many of whom were Coptic Christians, some of whose religious customs are almost identical. Beta Israel celebrate Passover and observe the Sabbath; succeeding post-Diaspora religious rites were unknown to them. This is, then, a people unfamiliar with the Twentieth Century, for whom a subsistence standard of living has been a way of life. They lived in small thatched huts, and built small circular clay buildings as synagogues.

This is also a people which has been inexcusably neglected. By their country, by the world at large, but inexplicably, by their co-religionists. Their presence has long been known, but interest in their state of being, and later their pathetic plight, has been slow to spark. Even when isolated groups of Canadian and American Jews began to evince some interest and concern, there was no organized movement to attempt to provide support. The State of Israel behaved as though this group did not exist.

No less an historian than Abba Eban, in Heritage: Civilization and the Jews, mentions them on three occasions in passing, with no reference to their historicity and heritage. Similarly, in the seminal work, The Jews: Their History, edited by Louis Finkelstein, Chancellor of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America, in a brief, dismissive sentence, it is noted: "The dark-skinned Falashas of Abyssinia, presumably descended from proselytes made in a remote age, retain their individuality even now." Thus in one fell swoop, while the venerableness of their existence is not disputed, the genuineness of their heritage is, and thus the legitimacy of their pride.

These views, sadly, are typical. As a result, Jewish welfare agencies neglected the Ethiopian Jews. Although some relief work was undertaken from the 1950s, it was sparse and sporadic. In 1973 the Sephardic chief rabbi of Israel declared himself finally to be satisfied that the Beta Israel were legitimately Jews. Soon afterward the Israeli government pronounced them to be eligible for Israeli citizenship under the Law of Return.

But no energetic activity to aid their emigration to Israel was undertaken. The Beta Israel themselves obviously hadn't the means by which they could effect transit to Israel, nor lobby the Ethiopian government to permit emigration. Relief agencies were slow to convince themselves to act in the interests of the Beta Israel.

Finally, North American concerned groups such as Friends of Falasha (Calgary), Ottawa chapter for Ethiopian Jewry, the Canadian Association for Ethiopian Jewry (Toronto and Montreal) began moving things forward. Countdown - New York Association for Ethiopian Jews and Centre for Beta Israel (Ramat Gan, Israel) began to lobby vigorously for public subscriptions. They sought to raise massive amounts needed to send food and medicine to the villages in Ethiopia, along with medical teams, and to pressure the Israeli government to act. Even so, the Israeli government appeared to be loathe to follow through on its own welcoming edict.

Finally, the desolation of the drought in Africa. Ethiopia was hard hit. the drought had devastated the countryside. With the growth of public concern and outrage over the horrific conditions in Ethiopia in late 1984, the world responded, sending great sums of money for relief work, airlifting medical teams, foodstuffs, tents and drugs to those hellholes of human despair.

The 400,000 Ethiopians who had fled from the dreadful drought and the fallout of the civil War in Eritrea Province to try to find comfort in the burgeoning camps in the Sudan were dying of starvation almost as quickly as those left behind in their villages.

Even in the camps of Sudan, mostly crowded with Muslim Ethiopians, the Ethiopian Jews were harassed and harried. The death rate from starvation and illness mounted day by day. Of the Ethiopian Jews who had made their way into the camps, roughly one-third died of privation and an epidemic of diseases before Israel launched its airlift. The rescue was never completed. It was estimated that some four thousand Jews were left behind in the camps when premature disclosure of news of the rescue halted the airlift.

The U.S. had acted as liaison to bring Sudanese officials and Israeli agents in concert to plan the logistics for the airlift. The Sudanese government had insisted that the planeloads of refugees from the rescue mission not be flown directly to Israel, but that they be flown first to another destination, then on to Israel - for diplomatic reasons. The news media were urged, and pledged themselves to secrecy so that the rescue attempt would not be jeopardized.

However, word did leak prematurely, effectively aborting the mission. When Foreign Minister Yitzhak Shamir had visited the United States several weeks earlier, he had told Jewish leaders that Israel would require about $100-million to resettle Ethiopian Jews. And then Leon Dalzhin, chairman of the Jewish Agency, the Israeli organization charged with absorbing new refugees, is said to have noted also in early December that there had been "a sudden jump in immigration, far beyond the figures we had projected for this and the coming year - one of the ancient tribes of Israel is due to return to its homeland". An Israeli magazine picked it up. One of its reporters had been the recipient of this coy little bit of news, and soon afterward the news of another dazzling Israeli coup was flashed around the world.

Dismayed, American Jews pressured their own government to rescue the estimated remaining four thousand Ethiopian Jews left behind in the camps. A later American airlift was able to find and remove a mere additional nine hundred, all that could be found of those who were left. Many had perished, and no doubt some had made the long trek back to their mountainside villages.

It is now estimated that an additional eight thousand women, children, the ill and the elderly are left to languish in Ethiopia. In early 1984 the Beta Israel communities had steadily been depleted as the young and the hale left to find refuge in the Sudan. Those who were unfit for travel were left behind in the primitive villages. Young children, the ill, the old and the women who care for them, are now left to fend for themselves. Those who had travelled to the refugee centres set up in the Sudan found the situation slightly better, with relief supplies and food being supplied as a good-will gesture by the Sudanese government for 'fellow Muslims' in an effort to help their neighbours. (This was, of course, at a time when the Sudan hadn't yet been hit as hard as Ethiopia; since then the situation in Sudan has paralleled that of its neighbour.) Food was anything but plentiful in the camps, hygiene was poor, and if those Jewish thousands had not been rescued what is left of a once-numerous tribe might well have dwindled to an endangered species.

The government of Israel still appears reluctant to use diplomacy to complete the rescue of Beta Israel. One might think that Israel is unwilling to further burden itself with this dark-skinned and primitive people. Granted, the rescue itself, the relocation of the refugees, their housing, medicine, food, clothing, education, work placement and training all require a massive expenditure of bureaucratic planning, and scarce Israeli shekels in an already over-strained war economy. But public subscription (particularly from North American sources) to assist the State in its commitment should help considerably to make up for the costs involved.

Perhaps settling this people throughout a country housing Jews whose background is European/Mediterranean/Arabic presents the government with another dilemma, integrating a socially and economically disadvantaged group whose existence was an embarrassment to the State.

Another thorny issue of course, is the reaction of the orthodox to this influx of 'others'. Both the Ashkenazic and the Sephardic chief rabbis have finally declared the Beta Israel to be truly Jews, with no need for further demeaning 'conversion' ceremonies. But regional orthodox rabbis are steadfastly refusing this recognition without the ceremonial of the mikva and ritual circumcision. The Beta Israel, deeply insulted by these emotionally injurious demands, are heartbroken at the turn of events. A protest march staged around Israel by the Beta Israel to bitterly demonstrate their opposition to the symbolic conversation (which holds their belief in their heritage in absolute contempt) was emotional and led many Ethiopian Jews to declare that this final humiliation compelled them to compare Israel unfavourably with their former condition in Ethiopia where they were at least recognized as Jews among strangers.

This is a sorry dilemma which deserves a fitting end. That end appears to be a long way off yet.