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Newsletter : 8fax1014.txt
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>JN Oct. 14, 1998, Vol. 6, No. 183
Israel's Wiesenthal Center Condemns Stein's Canonization
By IsraelWire
The head of the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Israel strongly condemned the Roman Catholic canonization ceremony making Jewish-born Edith Stein a saint.
"It is scandalous and painful that the Church chooses as symbolic
of the Holocaust a person who left Judaism to convert," Efraim
Zuloff said. "It's even more scandalous that this canonization
comes several days after the one at Zagreb of Cardinal Alojzije
Stepanic, an accomplice in the killings of hundreds of thousands of
Jews, gypsies and Serbs."
Pope John Paul II announced that the Church would commemorate the
Holocaust August 9 every year, in memory of a Stein, a Carmelite
nun who died on that day in the Auschwitz death camp and who was
made a saint Sunday. Her sainthood has upset Jews in general, who
claim she was one of their own and her conversion to the Catholic
faith was irrelevant.
"Their conversion, under the Nazi Nuremberg laws, did not alter
their origin. One cannot claim, therefore, that they suffered
martyrdom for their Catholic faith," said Tullia Zavi, a leader of
Italy's Jewish community.
Jewish circles also fear that her canonization will be one more
step in a campaign to "Christianize" the Holocaust during which 6
Million Jews died. Tens of thousands of non-Jews, many of them
Catholics, also died in the Nazi purges.
The Croatian Cardinal Stepinac was beatified as a martyr last
Sunday for his opposition to communist rule in post-war Yugoslavia.
Critics also pointed out that during the war he had been close to
Croatia's pro-Nazi Ustashi regime, notorious for its atrocities.
Stepanic is said to have saved Jews from persecution, but only on
condition that they converted to Catholicism.
Summit Set to Get Under Way at Wye River Center
By VOA's Ross Dunn (Jerusalem) & Gil Butler (State Department)
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says that following
another terror attack aimed at Israel, he sees no prospect of a
successful outcome for this week's Middle East peace summit in the
United States.
Netanyahu says there is "no chance at this stage" of signing an
interim peace deal with the Palestinians at this week's US summit,
following the killing of an Israeli by suspected Palestinian
gunmen.
He said this in a statement issued by his office, a few hours
after an Israeli man was shot dead and a second seriously wounded
in an attack in a Jerusalem forest, near the West Bank.
Netanyahu says if it turns out, as Israeli police suspect, that the
killers fled to a Palestinian-ruled area, then -- in his words --
"it is incumbent upon the Palestinian Authority to act immediately
to capture them."
President Clinton, Arafat and Netanyahu are to meet together
Thursday, near Washington. The US government wants the summit to
conclude a new interim peace deal, under which Israel would
withdraw from a further 13 percent of the West Bank in exchange for
measurable Palestinian steps to crack down on anti-Israeli
violence.
Netanyahu faces strong pressure from right-wing members of his
coalition not to sign an agreement. Supporters of Jewish
settlements in the West Bank have told Netanyahu any new agreement
with the Palestinians could spell the end of his government, which
holds a slender one-vote majority in the Israeli parliament.
The negotiations may result in an interim Middle East peace
agreement. The deal is expected to call for further Israeli troop
withdrawals from the West Bank in exchange for Palestinian action
to satisfy Israel's security requirements.
Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, who will take part in the
negotiations, spoke by phone with Netanyahu. Israeli demands for
tighter Palestinian control over security -- a crackdown on attacks
aimed at Israelis -- appears to be a major hurdle to be surmounted
before an interim agreement is reached.
During Albright's visit to the region last week, several other
interim issues were worked out: the percentage of land to be
returned and a Palestinian industrial park at Gaza among them.
But State Department spokesman James Rubin emphasizes that there is no guarantee that the Wye Plantation conference in rural eastern Maryland will yield an agreement.
Albright has set aside four full days to take part in the Wye River
summit. If an interim agreement is reached, officials say the goal
is to, at least, make a start in negotiating the even tougher final
status issues between the Palestinians and the Israelis -- the
future of Jerusalem, borders, refugee rights, Israeli settlements,
and the status of the Palestinian Authority.
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