Two New Books That Help Counter Media Bias

 
	For those who are frustrated by the constant torrent of 
distortions and falsehoods about Jews and Israel that appear in our 
media, two new books may provide some relief.

	The recent controversy over the publication of a blatantly 
anti-Semitic article in the Philadelphia Tribune, our city's African-
American weekly, is a troubling reminder of the persistence of anti-
Semitism in some segments of the black community.  The editors' 
decision to later dissociate themselves from the article, while 
pointedly refraining from apologizing for publishing it, was also
striking.  The episode points to the need for a sober reassessment of
black-Jewish relations, past and present.  A good place to start is 
What Went Wrong?  The Creation & Collapse of the Black-Jewish 
Alliance , by Dr. Murray Friedman, director of the Center of 
American Jewish History at Temple University (the publisher is The 
Free Press; to order, call 212-632-4909).  What Went
Wrong? provides a balanced and informative survey of relations 
between African-Americans and American Jews throughout the past 
two centuries, as well as some interesting recommendations for the 
path of future relations between the two communities.  

	Dr. Friedman's book is especially useful for college students, 
whose campuses are frequently visited by officials of Louis 
Farrakhan's Nation of Islam.  Farrakhan's disciples routinely 
exaggerate the role of Jews in black slavery, and minimize the role 
of Jews in the black civil rights movement.  What Went Wrong? 
provides some good counter-ammunition for confronting such 
extremists.

	For those concerned about media misrepresentations of 
Israel, Professor Edward Alexander's latest book, The Jewish Wars: 
Reflections by One of the Belligerents is must reading.  (The 
publisher is Southern Illinois University Press; to order, call 800-
346-2680.)

	With his pen slicing through his opponents' arguments like a 
sword, Professor Alexander takes aim at the critics of Israel.  How 
many times have you opened your newspaper to the op-ed page, or 
turned on a popular radio talk show, only to be confronted by 
Edward Said or Alexander Cockburn, blasting away at Israel's 
alleged misbehavior ...?  In this compelling book, Prof. Alexander
fights back without letup, but with plenty of wit, scholarship, and 
literary grace.

	Some years ago, an Israeli periodical referred to Alexander 
as "Jewry's premier polemicist."  That description is still valid, and 
his role in Jewish political and literary life is as significant as ever, 
because "the Zionist propaganda machine" --as anti-Zionists call it-- 
has been, in Alexander's words, "in a very creaky state since 1967."  
In the years since 1967, Alexander notes, "the campaign to 
undermine the moral image of the people Israel and the land of
Israel has flourished mightily.  Even the most brazen calumniators 
have, with relative impunity and with a pugnacious energy and 
inventiveness little short of demonic, disseminated a shared body of 
cliches, myths, and outright lies."

	In the pages of The Jewish Wars , Alexander exposes and 
demolishes those cliches, myths, and lies.  These 17 essays focus in 
part on those Alexander calls "the more brazen and flamboyant" of 
Israel's critics, from non-Jews such as George Ball and Pat 
Buchanan, to American Jews such as Noam Chomsky and
Michael Lerner, to those Israeli Jewish intellectuals who have 
distinguished themselves as fierce critics of their own country.  But 
beyond those individuals, Prof. Alexander takes aim at what he calls 
"certain omnipresent personality types: the timorous Jew cloaking 
his timidity in the robes of the biblical prophet; the treacherous Jew 
presenting betrayal of his own people as ethical idealism; the 
ferocious anti-Semite parading as a dispassionate 'critic of
Israeli policies'; the journalist and publicist exploiting to the full the
public-address and public-relations systems afforded by his 
profession while complaining that his voice is being 'stifled' by 'the 
Jewish establishment.' "

	The Jewish Wars is an intellectual tour de force; its 
educational value cannot be underestimated.   But it also makes for 
fascinating and enjoyable reading.

	In the "Jewish wars" --the fierce literary battles over Israel 
and the Jewish people-- Edward Alexander is indeed, as the title of 
his book says, "one of the belligerents."  It's a good thing he's on our 
side.

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