[Congressional Record Volume 152, Number 61 (Wednesday, May 17, 2006)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E856]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




          INSPIRING INTER-FAITH MUTUAL COOPERATION AND RESPECT

                                 ______
                                 

                          HON. THELMA D. DRAKE

                              of virginia

                    in the house of representatives

                        Wednesday, May 17, 2006

  Mrs. DRAKE. Mr. Speaker, I had a unique opportunity to address on 
Holocaust Memorial Day (April 25) about 200 clergy and lay leaders 
representing 64 churches of the Presbytery of Eastern Virginia at their 
quarterly meeting at the historic Carver Memorial Presbyterian Church 
in downtown Newport News.
  The gathering on that particular day of members of the Presbyterian 
Church, USA, was coincidental though my invitation to join them was 
not. It was a very thoughtful and touching gesture by a minister friend 
of mine, the Rev. Dick Keever of Bayside Presbyterian Church in 
Virginia Beach who served as the meeting's moderator. It speaks volumes 
of the inspiring inter-faith climate of mutual cooperation and respect 
in greater Hampton Roads which I've come to appreciate during my 21 
years of living in this community and serving it as a rabbi. From 1985 
to 1995 my congregation of Beth Chaverim was the only one in the world 
to meet in a Catholic facility, the most gracious Church Of The 
Ascension in Virginia Beach.
  I was most gratified and a bit concerned to be welcomed by 
Presbyterian colleagues and friends given the recent tensions born of 
the controversial resolution to consider divestment from companies 
doing business in Israel which impacts upon the Palestinians. I felt 
that resolution was far too one-sided and discriminatory failing to 
invest toward a better future for all. I also happen to be the first 
rabbi to have earned a doctoral degree from the Presbyterian affiliated 
McCormick Theological Seminary in Chicago, adding an intriguing 
dimension to my special encounter on a day reminding me more than any 
other of being a son of Polish Holocaust survivors. I spent my early 
childhood in a Displaced Persons Camp in Frankfurt, Germany, and then 
grew up in Haifa, Israel, prior to coming to Chicago in 1966 to join my 
Holocaust survivor grandmother who lost her own parents, five siblings 
and countless others.
  I was moved to share with my distinguished Presbyterian audience that 
the poison unleashed from the destruction of European Jewry had allowed 
for other genocides to occur, from the killing fields of Cambodia to 
Bosnia, Rwanda, Saddam Hussein's mass graves, suicide bombers wreaking 
havoc in New York and Israel, and Sudan's Darfur region where those 
with lighter skin color begrudge the presence and very lives of those 
with darker skin. The Holocaust, the defining event of the previous 
century, may yet prove to be the beginning of the end of civilized 
human life. After all, it took place in Christian Europe at the hands 
of the German nation deemed to be a leader in many fields, yet so 
quickly succumbing to the worst of human impulses. Though it was 
nourished by centuries of church led demonizing and dehumanizing, 
persecutions and expulsions of a vulnerable minority that in spite of 
its abuse as a scapegoat refused to abandon its distinct heritage. 
Among the Holocaust's victims were members of my father's family, 
direct descendents of Spanish Jews expelled in 1492 and ultimately 
invited to build the town of Zamosc in eastern Poland in 1588, till 
Hitler sealed their destiny in 1939 without the option even of 
conversion.
  The State of Israel, home to the largest number of Holocaust 
survivors who are now quickly diminishing with age, is the only nation-
state on earth threatened openly with annihilation by the President of 
another state, Iran, while he denies that the Nazi Holocaust ever took 
place and thus proposing one as he is bent on acquiring a nuclear 
capability. I pleaded with the Presbyterians, having the misguided 
divestment plan in mind, not to endanger in any way the Holocaust's 
survivors who did not seek revenge at the war's end but rather to 
rebuild their lives in an ancient homeland where the dream of universal 
peace was first conceived. Survivors, like my parents, living in an 
Israel which ironically has not known shalom's blessings since its 1948 
inception and on May 3rd will celebrate the 58th anniversary of the 
Jewish state. I vividly recall attending with my father Israeli 
military Independence Day parades early on, and his enthusiastic 
acclaim to the sight of a ``Jewish tank'' and a ``Jewish plane,'' a 
response to our dire helplessness in the past and the sacred act of 
defending one's people and honor.

  However, to presently despair in light of mighty challenges, would 
only betray the survivors noble and life-oriented spirit as well as the 
words of Anne Frank, one of a million and a half Jewish children 
including cousins of my own, ``in spite of everything I still believe 
that people are really good at heart, I simply can't build up my hopes 
on a foundation consisting of confusion, misery and death.'' Indeed 
Jews, Christians, Muslims and all who share our anguished planet-earth 
ought to be reassured by Anne's loving message and make her vision a 
reality for all children including Israeli and Palestinian, American 
and Chinese, now and forever.
  Rabbi Israel Zoberman is the spiritual leader of Congregation Beth 
Chaverim in Virginia Beach.

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