Jews, Jordan, and Jarba

The outraged militants who urge Harvard not to support Project Jarba, Phillips Brooks House's refugee resettlement program, unless Jews can participate, are oblivious both to political necessity and the magnitude of the social problem. In protesting the anti-Judaism of the Jordanian government they refuse to give due consideration to the plight of the refugees from Israel who are cooped in squalid camps along the Israel-Jordan border. Blindly indifferent to the angry and resentful anti-Jewish feeling continuously created by the refugee camps, they refuse to help resettle the refugees.

Israel and Jordan are at war. There is no reason to condone the war or the racist attitudes that accompany it, but anyone interested in peace must realize that an armed frontier engenders hatred. The ban on Jews which Jordan has imposed springs directly from years of violence and hostility between two nations. One wonders how realistic it would have been to demand that Japanese serve in front-line Red Cross units during World War II.

America's feverish racism during the last few wars leaves no room for pride or sanctimonious self-satisfaction. On the other hand, Americans who have the effect of the Powell amendment in destroying a recent school aid bills. Sightless crusading against prejudice can be as crippling as race hatred.

The Jordanian government has asked Harvard to accept a restriction. But those who proudly oppose Harvard's participation on this ground should be prepared to look with equal pride upon the refugees living in hovels upon a bare subsistence diet. They might remember that these conditions will persist indefinitely unless projects like Jarba succeed. Yet if the project does succeed, the opponents of Jarba will have the privilege of saying, "I oppose this: it was built with un-Jewish labor."