ecl@ahuta.UUCP (ecl) (01/08/85)
I just heard on the radio (NPR--National Public Radio) that "Operation Moses"
had been temporarily suspended last week because it had become public.
Apparently those people in charge of it wanted it kept secret and thought that
it was until then.
However, since it was discussed on Usenet at least a month ago, I'm not sure
how secret it could have been. What's the story here? Is it the Israeli
government's role that was secret or what?
Evelyn C. Leeper
...{ihnp4, houxm, hocsj}!ahuta!eclariels@orca.UUCP (Ariel Shattan) (01/09/85)
> I just heard on the radio (NPR--National Public Radio) that "Operation Moses" > had been temporarily suspended last week because it had become public. > Apparently those people in charge of it wanted it kept secret and thought that > it was until then. > > However, since it was discussed on Usenet at least a month ago, I'm not sure > how secret it could have been. What's the story here? Is it the Israeli > government's role that was secret or what? > > Evelyn C. Leeper > ...{ihnp4, houxm, hocsj}!ahuta!ecl Well, when I called my local UJA as prompted by the original article, the woman I spoke with got all in a tizzy because someone had posted to the net. I eventually got a call from a woman down in LA who claimed to be West Coast assistant organizer or something. She was very concerned that it had gotten into the net, because it was supposed to be private information. As she explained it, the info was supposed to stay in the Jewish community, and not get written down (i.e., remain word-of-mouth). She told me that if Operation Moses became general knowledge, the people running it in Israel would stop it. Why? I don't know. They were afraid that the posting has violated this "keep it unwritten" rule. Operation Moses was also in the newspaper here in Portland, and when I asked her about that, she said that someone had leaked the info to one of the wire services, but that they were hoping that the leak, since it didn't come from the UJA, wouldn't stop the operation. That's all I know about it. Anyone else? Ariel (can we talk about it now?) Shattan ..!tektronix!orca!ariels
naiman@pegasus.UUCP (Ephrayim J. Naiman) (01/09/85)
<munch, munch> > I just heard on the radio (NPR--National Public Radio) that "Operation Moses" > had been temporarily suspended last week because it had become public. > Apparently those people in charge of it wanted it kept secret and thought > that it was until then. > > However, since it was discussed on Usenet at least a month ago, I'm not sure > how secret it could have been. What's the story here? Is it the Israeli > government's role that was secret or what? > > Evelyn C. Leeper > ...{ihnp4, houxm, hocsj}!ahuta!ecl When I called the UJA they were very hesitant about letting me post to the net because of the "secrecy" involved. I explained to them that basically only Jews were reading this newsgroup and they said OK. They didn't want a lot of discussion on the net, however. I have a feeling that the whole operation of bringing Jews out itself was supposed to be "secret." Not only that Israel was doing it, but that monies were being collected for Israel and that in general it was getting to be a big thing. -- ==> Ephrayim J. Naiman @ AT&T Information Systems Laboratories (201) 576-6259 Paths: [ihnp4, allegra, ahuta, maxvax, cbosgd, lzmi, ...]!pegasus!naiman
rosen@inmet.UUCP (01/14/85)
The official word is that Operation Moses, the rescue effort of
Ethiopian Jews, has been stopped.
The entire operation was to be kept quiet, not exactly secret.
That meant that nothing was to go in print, but it could be
discussed among small groups to enable the fundraising that was
needed to subsidize the efforts.
Unfortunately, news about the efforts started getting into the
newspapers, and last Thursday Israel decided to make a (terse)
statement to acknowledge the efforts (since everyone knew about
it and about Israel's involvement).
The official notificiation, however, caused the problems that
were expected. The Sudan (where the Jews were being airlifted
from) does not have official ties with Israel, and did not want
it publicly known that they were cooperating. They are very
touchy, because of their connections to the USSR and the Arab
countries. Similar for Ethiopia.
The effort was able to bring out somewhere around 7000-8000 people.
The absorption process has been started on all, and is going well.
However, these efforts will be long (expected to take twice the
usual time for new immigrants) and VERY costly (perhaps @25,000 per
person). Financial support is still needed. As noted before,
checks can be sent to: United Jewish Appeal
1290 Avenue of the Americas
New York, NY 10104
Att.: Operation Moses