WE REMEMBER THE TERRIBLE SUICIDE BUS BOMBINGS ONE YEAR AGO IN TEL AVIV AND JERUSALEM—"This issue of ISRAFAX was to have been our traditional Purimspiel humor number...But the March 3rd and 4th bombings in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, the fourth and fifth terrorist assaults in a week, raising the one-week death toll to at least 56, has changed the nature of this special issue. These unending, tragic murders, following the horror of Yitzhak Rabin’s assassination, have placed Israelis under almost unbearable strain. They have underlined key issues, and raised new doubts, about the nature and course of the peace process itself..."—Professor Frederick Krantz (March 11, 1996) [Israfax, Vol. VIII, No. 191]
ISRAEL AND THE PALESTINIANS: THEORY AND PRACTICE—"...Despite all the abstract theorizing about Israeli-Palestinian relations, the ‘intifada’ is best understood at the personal level, an understanding shared by all Israeli Jews. The intifada is the women who cannot sleep at night worrying about the welfare of a son or husband in the army or on reserve duty. And after the Egged bus, forced off a high cliff by a Muslim fundamentalist from Gaza, it is the black-on-white signs posted on walls across the country, announcing the victims’ funerals..."—Professor Harold Waller (July 13, 1989) [Israfax, Vol. I, No. 27]
MIRACLE OF SOVIET ALIYAH MUST BE MADE REAL BY THE JEWISH PEOPLE—"The revised projection of 1 million Soviet immigrants to Israel over the next 3-5 years, a figure undreamed of as recently as six months ago, is a kind of miracle, in terms both of modern Jewish history and of the Zionist movement. But it is a miracle which can come to pass only with the immediate and sustained action both of Israel and the Jewish people as a whole..."—Professor Frederick Krantz (Jan. 26, 1990) [Israfax, Vol. 2, No. 53]
THE IRAQ CRISIS AND MIDDLE EAST TRUTHS—"The Iraqi swallowing of Kuwait provides an opportunity…to re-learn certain truths about the Middle East. It is often said that the key to peace in that region is to solve the ‘Palestinian question’. The Middle East unfortunately provides ample cases of the fallacy of that statement, of regionally-destabilizing violence—Lebanon, the Iran-Iraq war—far removed from the ‘Palestinian question’. The real cause of tension in the Middle East is Arab internal instability and intra-Arab conflict..."—Rabbi Reuben Poupko (Aug. 18, 1990) [Israfax, Vol. 2, No. 78]
MENAHEM BEGIN, 1913-1992—"With the passing of Menahem Begin, a profoundly important chapter in the modern history of the Jewish people, which he helped to write, comes to a close…All of us, whatever our political commitments, have lost in Menahem Begin the last of the great Founders, an indomitable Jew, a proud Zionist, and a remarkable human being."—Professor Frederick Krantz (March 27, 1992) [Israfax, Vol. IV, No. 136]
YITZHAK RABIN, 1922-1995—"The greatest respect we can pay to the memory of Yitzhak Rabin is a determined, principled re-commitment to Jewish democracy and Jewish unity. The aggressively divisive, exclusionary and sometimes paranoid style of much Israeli political discourse, rooted in the pre-history of the Yishuv and increasingly reflected in Diaspora Jewish politics, must be condemned and abandoned..."—Professor Frederick Krantz (Dec. 5, 1995) [Israfax, Vol. VI, No. 189]
FLASHBACK
PRIME MINISTER SHAMIR TO HOLD "SECRET" TALKS WITH PALESTINIANS—(Jerusalem) Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir will hold secret talks with Palestinian figures from the Territories…Ma’ariv reports…Palestinians reportedly will include prominent activists, including some linked to Al Fatah, Arafat’s PLO faction...(June 29, 1989) [Israfax. Vol. 1. No. 25]
LABOUR LEADERS VOTE 41-2 TO QUIT UNITY GOVERNMENT—(Jerusalem) The Labour Party voted 41-2 on a resolution recommending leaving the national unity government formed with the Likud in December, 1988...The executive led by Shimon Peres and Yitzhak Rabin [felt] the Cabinet-approved peace plan was unacceptable to the Palestinians. The plan calls for: no elections until the "Intifada" ends, no voting by East Jerusalem Palestinians, continued settlement in the Territories, and no giving up of Territories’ land as part of a peace settlement. (July 13, 1989) [Israfax, Vol. 1, No. 27]
INTIFADA MOST-COVERED ‘88 TV
NEWS ISSUE—(New York) The
Israeli-Palestinian conflict received more prime-time TV network news coverage than any
other event last year. The Tyndall Report on network news coverage reported that CBS, NBC
and ABC spent a total of 568 minutes covering the "Intifada",
compared to 456 minutes on Panamanian strongman Noriega and 401 minutes on Michael
Dukakis’ Presidential campaign. (July 27, 1989) [Israfax, Vol. I, No. 29]
DEATH TOLLS RISE IN LEBANON WAR—(Beirut) At least 28 people died, and 80 were wounded, in Christian-Syrian artillery duels last Wednesday, as 50,000 shells fell on the shattered city...Over 500 Lebanese civilians have perished, 20,000 wounded, and over 60,000 have fled, (many to the south, and to Israel’s "security zone"). 1.7 million—half the population—have left since the civil war began 14 years ago. (Aug. 3, 1989) [Israfax, Vol. 1, No. 30]
WAR IN THE GULF!—(Montreal) News reports here indicate that the White House has confirmed that "Operation Desert Storm", for the "liberation of Kuwait", has begun. As Israfax went to press early this morning, the media carried the first reports of waves of night-time airstrikes against a fogged-in Baghdad. (Jan. 18, 1991) [Israfax, Vol. 2, No. 97]
RACISM RESOLUTION REVERSED—(New York) The United Nations hardly deserves applause for waiting 16 years to rescind a disgraceful declaration that should never have been adopted. Still, it is a mark of different and better times that the General Assembly this week repealed Resolution 3370, which assailed Zionism as "a form of racism and racial discrimination". The pity is that most Arab states, including those ostensibly seeking peace with Israel, voted yet once again to impugn the very birthright of the Jewish state. (Jan. 3, 1992) [Israfax, Vol. III, No. 130]
ISRAFAX AT 200:
AN INTERVIEW WITH PROF. FREDERICK KRANTZ
Karen Lazar
CIJR: Can you comment on the origins and evolution of CIJR’s "ISRAFAX" magazine?
Prof. Frederick Krantz: Well, the Institute began nine years ago as a spontaneous reaction by a group of Montreal academics to unfair media delegitimation of Israel, related to the then-new intifada . We began speaking and writing, and soon one of our objectives was to have a regular voice, a publication which would bring objective data and analysis on Israel and the Middle East quickly to the community and to the media. But our financial resources were so limited we didn’t have enough money to publish a magazine (which needs paper, mailing envelopes, stamps, a printer, and so on). We did have an old Macintosh computer, and using a then-new device called a fax-modem we were able to send the early numbers around electronically, by fax, at almost zero cost—hence the name, ISRAFAX (which is also, of course a play on "Israel—[the] Facts", which we wanted to supply).
What started as a one-page weekly sheet directed at community leadership was soon a two-, and then a four-pager, and as demand grew after a few years it became an eight-page fortnightly, oriented towards the larger community, Jewish and non-Jewish. And, as ISRAFAX became known, demand for it from people without faxes resulted in a printed version, which in turn grew and metamorphosed into the current monthly magazine. What initially circulated only in Montreal is sent today across Canada, the U.S. and Israel (and to Latin America and Europe).
CIJR: Does ISRAFAX have a specific political orientation?
Prof. Krantz: Aside from a basic commitment to support democratic Israel, no. I like to say that in both North American and Israeli terms, we are neither pro-right nor pro-left, but pro-truth. That may sound naive, but I think it quite concretely reflects not only the terrible lessons our twentieth century has taught us about how destructive ideology can be, but what, on a deeper level, Judaism teaches about the pursuit of truth and justice. We are also traditionally Zionist in Jewish terms, which means that we view the creation of a sovereign Jewish state after the Holocaust and 2,000 years of Exile and powerlessness as a kind of miracle, and that we see that State as the vital center of the Jewish People. Individuals have every right to their particular political values and views, but what we stand for, and try to encourage, is basic, shared support for democratic Israel, and for a strong and dynamic Jewish community here, in Diaspora.
CIJR: Is ISRAFAX unique? Does it really influence the public?
Prof. Krantz: Well, it certainly is unique in Canada—there is no other nationally-distributed Israel-related monthly featuring academic analysis and directed at the public, not other academics. (And while there are a number of fine Middle East academic journals published in the States, again, none orients directly to the public as we do. And, oddly—or not so oddly, actually—we have a growing number of readers in Israel, where our English-language sampling of North American materials and opinion is also unique.)
ISRAFAX digests important data and opinion for CIJR members, and plays an important role in articulating Israel-related and Jewish-world issues for government, media and the non-Jewish public. In that sense, we certainly do influence people, and we know important community organizations and government agencies use and refer to us, sometimes requesting briefings, and that the media orient to us for data and opinion.
Yes, we have an impact, a remarkable one, out of all proportion to the modest self-financed fiscal base on which ISRAFAX and independent CIJR rests.
CIJR: As we go to press with No. 200, what thoughts do you wish to share with our readers?
Prof. Krantz: Well, its been a very satisfying privilege to have been able to create a publication not only combining a high level of analysis with clear and understandable prose, but conveying an intelligent and "open" approach to Israel and Jewish issues in a media world often marked by superficiality, or downright antagonism. And, too, I’m proud of our independence, of the fact that we’ve been able to do this by raising our own funds, and on a largely volunteer-labor basis (all our Fellows are volunteers, as are the lay researchers who provide many support functions).
We’ve achieved a great deal and haven’t missed a beat across 200 issues—I think this a great achievement, and want to thank all the many good people whose commitment over the years has helped make CIJR, and hence ISRAFAX, possible. I could not have know when we brought out our first simple 1-pager nine years ago that we’d be celebrating number 200 of a sophisticated, well-produced, internationally-distributed magazine today.
(Professor Frederick
Krantz is the founder and director of the Canadian Institute for Jewish Research.
He has served as editor-in-chief of ISRAFAX from its inception nine years ago.)
"Jewish life is suffering from a shortage of leadership…What is charismatic leadership? A person who can communicate with others because of his knowledge and convictions, and can influence people by what he is and not by what he has."—Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz, on the completion of 22 volumes of his modern Hebrew translation of the Talmud (Feb. 2, 1990) [Israfax, Vol. 2, No. 54]
"This is the war of right against wrong and is a crisis between Allah’s teachings and the devil…God has…put the Arabs in a most progressive position in which the Iraqis are among the foremost..."—Iraq’s Saddam Hussein (CNN, Sept. 5, 1990) [Israfax, Vol. 2, No. 82]
"...I have urged Israel to negotiate with the PLO and I still believe that some compromise peace must be arrived at…But the endorsement of Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait by the PLO, by supposedly moderate Palestinians…has put a knife in the back of the peace process..."—Meretz leader Yossi Sarid (Aug. 16, 1990) [Israfax, Vol. 2, No. 82]
"Why do Americans trust the Jews? After all, didn’t they kill Jesus Christ?"—Syria’s foreign minister addressing visiting Americans (New York Times, April 17, 1992) [Israfax, Vol. IV, No. 138]
"...Let me be clear. We are talking about autonomy and not the declaration of another state."—Israeli foreign minister Shimon Peres on first reports of the initiative worked out between his staff and the PLO in Oslo on Palestinian self-rule. (Globe and Mail, Aug. 27, 1993) [Israfax, Vol. V, No. 164]
"Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin...out of all the days of my life, I do not believe there is one such as this..."—King Hussein of Jordan on peace with Israel (Jerusalem Post, Aug. 26, 1994) [Israfax, Vol. VI, No. 178]
"Things that have been done already, I think it will be very, very hard to change..."—Likud MK Ariel Sharon, recognizing that elements of Oslo 2 are unlikely to be reversed (Jerusalem Post, Nov. 25, 1995) [Israfax, Vol. VI, No. 189]
"There is a God in heaven."—Meretz leader Yossi Sarid, after early election results showed Shimon Peres capturing the premiership in the election won by Bibi Netanyahu (June 13, 1996) [Israfax Vol. VII, No. 194]
"...The first and most important peace that should be made is the peace within Israel, the peace between us. This is the most important challenge at this time..."—Prime Minister-elect Benjamin Netanyahu, in his victory address to the nation (Jerusalem, Jan. 2, 1996) [Israfax, Vol. VII, No. 194]