INDIAN INSTITUTE FOR RESEARCH INTO TRUE HISTORY

NEWSLETTER NO. 38 OF 16 FEBRUARY 2002

1. NEWS AND CURRENT AFFAIRS

1.1 Rationalism of Veer Savarkar ( in English )

Shree Godbole has started work on an English version of his book in Marathi. So far he has completed the 1st draft of The Prologue / Preface and Parts I to VIII. Our friend Pandit Ramakrushnayya of London has undertaken the most difficult and important task of checking the draft and making valuable suggestions for improvements. Godbole's original intention was to finish the entire works by February 2003. However, due to certain unexpected unfortunate events the work has been delayed and is now expected to be ready by July 2003.

1.2 Film on Veer Savarkar

At last the film on Veer Savarkar in Hindi was released in Hindusthan on 30 November 2001. We heard from many friends who saw the film that it has been very well done. Our hearty congratulations to famous music director Sudheer Phadake and all others involved in its production.

1.3 This is Nathuram speaking

Nathuram Godse shot and killed Mahatma Gandhi on 30 January 1948. His story has never been fully told. Above play was written some 15 years ago. There were some shows on stage in Maharashtra and in America. But, as expected Congressites made such a fuss about it that the play was banned by Government of Maharashtra. We were informed in October 2001 that the High Court of Mumbai has lifted the ban. We do hope that the play is translated into English for worldwide publicity.

1.4 Events of 11 September 2001 and after

On 11 September 2001 some Muslim Fundamentalists hijacked two planes belonging to United Airlines and crashed them into the World Trade Centre in New York. The twin towers collapsed killing some 7,000 people working in the buildings as well as 400 firemen who rushed to their rescue. All the passengers on board the planes and the hijackers also died. ( on 30 November 2001 the twin towers toll was below 3,500 including 76 Britons)

The news shook the world. Third hijacked plane crashed and damaged Pentagon in Washington. Osama Bin Laden who had been hiding in Afghanistan is the chief suspect for the suicide attacks. America took revenge on the perpetrators. We have a lot to learn from this tragedy and its aftermath. Here are our observations.

WHAT AMERICANS DID ELSEWHERE

* It is natural to feel sorry for the innocent American civilians who were killed. But what was America doing all these years? They have been helping suppressive regimes to kill innocent civilians all over the world. As long as American interests were served ordinary Americans turned a blind eye to such massacres. This has happened in countries of Central and South Americas. America has always supported dictatorial governments who treat native Indians like dirt. America never bothered about the human rights of those people.

* America was implicated in the assassinations of a number of world leaders in the 1960s and 1970s - although US law was changed in 1975 to ban the CIA from killing foreign heads of state. In 1960 CIA agents killed Patrice Lumumba, leader of Congo. They tried to kill Fidel Castro of Cuba several times, in 1961 Rafael Trujillo of Dominican Republic was shot dead by US backed rebels. In 1963 Ngo Dinh Diem, President of South Vietnam was killed in a US backed coup.

Worst of all in 1973, a US backed uprising toppled Salvador Allende, Chile's left-wing (but democratically elected) president. Allende was killed in the fighting and Right-wing General Augusto Pinochet was installed in his place. And who is credited with this nasty work? Head of CIA, Mr George Bush, father of present US president George W Bush

(Metro 24 September 2001).

* When America has no qualms in carrying out such violent acts abroad, why should not the same happen to them in their country? As you sow, so shall you reap. We must think and NOT get carried away by emotions.

IMMIGRATION POLICY OF AMERICA

* We should feel sorry to the extent that many Hindus (including Sikhs) died in this incident. Otherwise, we must say that the Americans paid for their arrogance. Their immigration officers in Mumbai are just as rude and obstinate as their British counterparts. Here are some examples

Case I

We want to go to America

Why?

My son's wife is expecting a baby.

So?

We want to help her.

America is not a third world country. We have all the up to date facilities. We do not need your help. Visa refused.

Case IA ( similar to above )

We will grant visa to your wife, but not to you. What business have to got to be in

America

Case II

We want to go to America

Why?

I have two sons who are settled in America. We want to visit them.

How old are you?

Fifty-four

We do not think you are a genuine visitor. You are seeking job in America under the pretext of visiting your sons. Visa refused.

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Case III

We want to go to America.

Why?

My wife wants to see her sister. I have retired from service and my son and daughter are married in India.

We do not think you are a genuine visitor. Permission refused.

These are true cases and not fictitious.

But, when it came to the hijackers, there was no questioning. Hijackers were easily allowed in by American Immigration authorities. Of the hijackers who launched the terrorist attacks passed through Britain in 2001. Several of them were here as recently as 3 months ago, raising the suspicion that the plot could have been hatched in U.K. They were abroad each of the four hijacked flights.

More than half of the 19 hijackers appear to have been Saudi nationals - and Mr bin Laden is himself a Saudi, though long since deprived of citizenship.

[So, how did he travel? who supplied him the travel documents? ]

FAILURE OF THE INTELLIGENCE GATHERING AUTHORITIES

* What the F.B I does not know is precisely when the 11 terrorists arrived in the U.K. Such was the level of planning for the coordinated hijackers that it is more than likely that they arrived on fake passports and have, over the years, assumed several different identities. Cloned credit cards and mobile phones may also have been used and the complexities of Arab names to the untrained Western eye has also made the police's task that much harder.

The presence of the hijackers in Britain was conclusively established from documents and financial records, including credit cards, found at addresses in Florida and California. The reality is, however, that levels of intelligence about Islamic terrorism are desperately low in the U.K and officers are only now beginning a desperate game of catch-up.

(This could have been avoided if Britain had not been watching with disinterest, the Muslim terrorist activities in India, many of whom were recruited and trained here and have permanent residence here. And this fact was well publicised in British papers)

* The failure of British intelligence to keep track of Islamic fundamentalist terrorists in this country drew angry criticism. M.I.5 chiefs are said to have allowed terror groups to operate in Britain in the belief that they could be easily tracked and their networks identified. But critics say that in practice the service did not keep tabs on Middle Eastern terror suspects and granted them what amounted to a licence to operate.

By the time Stella Rimington quit as head of M.I.5 in 1996, it is said to have been out of touch with Middle Eastern terror groups, who had used asylum seeker routs to put agents into Britain, and placed and recruited operatives among the large numbers of Middle Eastern students welcomed by British universities.

A key point in the breakdown of British intelligence is said to have been kidnapping of 18 Western tourists in Yemen in December 1998, of whom four were killed in a rescue operation. At the centre of the affair were British trainee terrorists.

The incident, according to M.I.5 critics, showed that the service ' hadn't a clue ' about what was happening. There have been complaints from intelligence services in France, Israel and Egypt that Middle Eastern terrorists have been using Britain as a planning base. Explosions on the Paris Metro are said to have followed instructions from London.

( Daily Mail 24 September 2001 )

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ROLE OF PAKISTAN

Roger Howard reported for Daily Mail on 24 September 2001

'Will the secret enemy within Pakistan get its finger on the nuclear trigger?'

The role of The Inter Service Agency (ISI) at this vital time should be to do the bidding of the government. In particular, it should be to rein in the savage and potentially destabilising activities of the country's armed militia - many paradoxically funded, armed and trained by the ISI as part of its primary concern to drive India from 'occupied' Kashmir. But don't count on it. Although the ISI has been deeply involved in attempts to persuade the Taliban to surrender Bin Laden, it has always supported the Kabul regime it did so much to build. One reason for the ISI's pro-Taliban bias is the conviction that, with a friendly regime in Moslem Afghanistan to the west, Pakistan could concentrate its armed forces on its eastern frontiers and intensify the Kashmir struggle.

How ironic it would be if the U.S attempt to root out aggressive fundamentalism in Afghanistan ended with similar forces triumphant in Pakistan. The irony would be all the greater because, in many respects, the ISI was modelled on the CIA. In the past, the two have often co-operated, not least in building up fundamentalist forces in Afghanistan to fight the Soviet invaders.

So, what exactly is the ISI's game? The truth is that the Taliban is, or was until very recently, the ISI's creature. Back in the early Eighties, when America ( and to a lesser extent, Saudi Arabia ) was funding and arming those anti-Soviet fighters, huge amounts of American money and material was funnelled through Pakistan. General Zia, Pakistan's then military dictator, used the ISI as the conduit for this aid. It came to be staffed by many thousands of hand-picked men in Zia's mould. They were chosen from the armed forces for their loyalty and religious fervour. Most of them were Pathans, a people who live on both sides of the frontier between Pakistan and Afghanistan.

While the Taliban was fighting to gain control of Afghanistan, the ISI arranged initially for crucial, cross-border artillery barrages to support them. Since the Taliban emerged as a major player in 1995, it has been beholden to the ISI, which has provided it with masses of munitions and material.

The West would be foolish indeed to count on the loyalty of the ISI.

* Question that was never asked - when Pakistan backed Talibans were in power in Afghanistan why did some 2 million Afghan refugees stay in Pakistan? Why were they not sent back to Afghanistan? The reason is simple. Under the pretext of helping refugees, America and the west gave financial help to Pakistan.

* Pakistan did well out of this crisis as we expected. Bush lifted sanctions on India and Pakistan imposed because of their nuclear explosions. The truth was that U.S sanctions were hurting Pakistan far more than India. Even Bill Clinton wanted to lift sanctions against Pakistan, before he retired in January 2001. Now Bush found perfect excuse for doing so. And to show even handed approach he lifted sanctions against India also.

On 24 September Rahul Bedi reported from New Delhi for the Daily Telegraph " Lifting of sanctions a 'sweetener' for siding with US. "

The White House said the sanctions were no longer in America's 'national security interest' ( So, everything boils down to being in 'America's national interests' ) as it prepared to confront Afghanistan's ruling Taliban and bin Laden, the regime's guest.

The move means that Pakistan will be able to claim economic aid and loans denied in 1999 after Pakistan's military took over the democratically elected government and engaged in tit-for-tat nuclear tests with India.

America considers Pakistan's assistance vital as it borders Afghanistan and has extensive intelligence on the Taliban regime it helped to install in Kabul.

Pakistan is now entitled to make military purchases and is eligible for economic aid from the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank to help over its foreign debt of more than 25 billion pounds.

* Peter Popham reported from Islamabad for Independent On 24 September

' America ends punishment imposed for testing of nuclear weapons '

Bush indicated as long ago as July 2001 that he wanted to lift sanctions against Pakistan.. Sanctions suspended military sales to India and Pakistan and prohibited new credit guarantees and international loans. It also banned countries from exporting 'items controlled for nuclear or missile reasons' to the chronically hostile South Asian neighbours. Little harm was done to India, with its far larger and more buoyant economy, but Pakistan, which has scant foreign reserves and huge burden of debt repayments, was plunged into an economic crisis from which it has yet to emerge. As well as the lifting of sanctions, the U.S has also agreed to reschedule 412 million pounds of Pakistan's debt.

But by bartering nuclear restraint for co-operation on terrorism, Mr Bush risks giving a green light to other countries that might be on the verge of developing nuclear weapons, which will now hear the message that they can proceed without fear of penalty. In this haste to make the world free from one form of terror, Mr Bush risks condemning it to a different type a year or two down the road.

A similar myopic approach 20 years ago - when the CIA poured billions of dollars into Afghanistan's mujahedin and Islamic radical groups form other countries to enable them to fight America's proxy war in Afghanistan against the Soviet Union - produced a monster called Osama bin Laden.

Twenty years from now, yesterday's decision may be condemned for a similar reason.

* What we did not expect was the collapse of the opposition from Muslim Fundamentalists in Pakistan. They simply fizzled out instead of causing an uprising. That has lesson for us. We should not feel afraid of such people when we want to carry out our reforms and take firm action.

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PROPHESYS PROVED WRONG.

Military experts had warned that America could not win the war. They gave several reasons for this

(1) Taliban fighters

* Colonel Yuri Malishev wrote in Daily Mail on 19 September 2001 ' As a Red Army veteran of the Afghan war, I believe Bush is making a terrible mistake -he'll never beat the Taliban' He explained - The Taliban fighters that American and British forces will come up against are invisible. It is hard to explain what it is like to face enemies you cannot see. They move around in the mountains with impunity. They are constantly one step ahead of you - time and again. Over years they have laid down supplies of firepower, bombs, food and clothing in remote parts of this rough and mountainous terrain, which they know like back of their hands. Yet this is an environment which is utterly alien even to the best-trained soldier from other countries '

' Taliban may seem like a primitive force, but don't be deceived. If today's coalition of world powers does decide to invade Afghanistan, it has failed to learn the lessons of history. One Soviet veteran remarked this week in Moscow that the Americans would think Vietnam was a picnic compared with what they would face on the ground in Afgnahistan.'

* The head of the German equivalent of the SAS has angered senior Nato officers by predicting a "bloodbath" if special forces from allied nations move into Afghanistan to try to hunt down Osama bin Laden.

In a deliberate call for caution, Brig General Reinhard Gunzel, who commands the elite Kommando Spezialkrafte ( KSK) said success would be almost impossible without severe and unacceptable losses to his special troops and those of other allied nations.

Even if such a combined force did find bin Laden, this would not mean victory, he said " Behind him stand so many fanatic followers that another one would immediately replace him."

The 57-year-old brigadier general added : " Special forces would come lightly armed and unprotected. There would be a bloodbath. No special unit in the western world could agree to such an action."

The Brig Gen insisted that troops with a 'western philosophy' and a will not to die would have "little chance against men who are willing to give their lives in a fight."

( Daily Telegraph 24 September 2001, page2 )

Daily Telegraph also carried a report from David Blair in Peshawar. He wrote, " The veteran fighters from Afghanistan's Mujahideen exchanged memories of their victorious war against the former Soviet Union, fought between 1979 and 1989, with delight. On one point, they were adamant - any American soldier entering Afghanistan would share the fate of the Soviet army. Maulana Inyadullah who began fighting the Soviet invasion in 1982 at the age 16 and his colleagues are training guerrillas for the war inside Indian controlled Kashmir. What they call "Indian terrorism " ranks alongside America in their pantheon of evil.

But if any American troops set foot in Afghanistan, they will return to their homeland and join a new jihad against the latest foreign invader. They view their possible opponent with genial contempt. Mr Inyadullah, 35, said : " The Americans would be easier to defeat than the Russians. The Americans lead lavish lives and they are afraid of death. We are not afraid of death. The Americans love Pepsi Cola, we love death."

By contrast, the former fighters had a wary respect for Russian soldiers, especially those from the Spetsnaz special forces. Ali Amjud, 40, paid tribute to the prowess of the invaders he had fought. " The Russians were very brave and they were used to mountain warfare. The Spetsnaz were very dangerous, they climbed mountains like goats. Despite the fierce fights with Russians Mr Amjud never had any doubts about the final victory. " All the weapons, training and technology of the Russians gave way because they had no purpose in life. They only fought for a salary. We fought for the cause of Islam, because Allah commanded us."

" We embraced death, we were willing to be martyrs" he said.

(2) The Talibans also have Stringer missiles - the sophisticated U.S - built surface to surface missiles that Washington supplied in the mid -1980s to the mujahedin ( holy warriors ) fighting against the Soviet Union. ( Independent 24 September 2001 )

(3) The Afghan opposition forces in the north are not large. They have about 15,000 well-trained men, many of them in Panjshir, and another 40,000 militia, but they are now-finally -likely to receive as much money and as many arms as they want.

(Daily Telegraph 24 September 2001).

Moreover we were told that they are not a homogenous group and consist of Uzbecks, Tajiks, Hazaras and Persian speaking Heratis. They had nothing in common except utter hatred of Talibans.

(4) From late October to May, thick snow blankets much of Afghanistan, effectively shutting down the whole country. .. Said Mushtaba, a logistics officer for the opposition Northern Alliance, said : " We never launch offensives in winter. You can only get around in the mountains on foot, vehicles are no use."

(5) Other difficulty quoted was short time available for action by America. Ramadan, the Muslim holy month begins on 17 November. So, America will have to stop its military action for a month and once that is over there will be winter in Afghanistan making any kind of war impossible

All these doubts were proved wrong. There were no reprisals against Americans or Britons in Islamic countries even though they did not stop bombing during the month of Ramadan

THE END RESULT

It is surprising how quickly the Talibans were smashed. They did not put any sort of fight at all, let alone fight for the last man on any battle ground. Here is the summary of events

24 September 2001-- 1000 Muslim clerics last week called on Bin Laden to leave Afghanistan voluntarily.

1 October --- Taliban rulers admitted that they were hiding Osama bin Laden.

7 October -- Americans start bombing Taliban strongholds

17 November - Kabul falls

21 November - Kandahar and Kunduz still controlled by Taliban

27 November - Kunduz falls

28 November - U.S prepares for attack on Kandahar

30 November - Alliance is inside last stronghold - Kandahar

7 December - Taliban rule 'over' as arms are surrendered.

SOMETHING FOR EVERYONE

Surprisingly enough interests of many diverse countries coincided and America got their full co-operation

* One immediate concession that Vladimir Putin of Russia sought was a promise from Washington not to question the brutal military campaign in Chechnya, where Russia says it too is fighting against Islamic 'terrorists'.

* Uzbekistan has also suffered from Islamic terrorism. In February 1999 the normally verdant peace of the capital Tashkent was rocked by an assassination attempt on Mr Karimov. At the time US embassy officials in Tashkent highlighted the military precision of the attack and said they were convinced that the terrorists had received training in Afghanistan and were backed by Osama bin Laden.

Mr Karimov was quick to blame Uzbekistan's Islamic terrorists and launched a crackdown. Human rights organisations reported that more than 5,000 Muslims were arrested, of whom some 500 remain in jail ( Daily Telegraph 24 September 2001. )

* Iran would have declared war on Taliban had it not been for the events of 11 September. Iranis are Shias and Talibans are Sunnis. Their feud goes back centuries. Moreover the drug trafficking by Taliban had created a very serious problem for Iran.

* China too has her own problem of Muslim separatists in its northwest region of Xinjing which share a short border with Afghanistan..

INTERNATIONAL LAW - WHAT LAW ?

The whole episode showed that Might is Right is still the law. What happened the UNO? Did that body approve use of military force? Nobody even raised this question.

HINDUS REPRESENTED AT LAST

On 24 September 2001 David Sapsted reported from New York for Daily Telegraph

Prayers and patriotism ease the grief.

A palatable feeling of the families' loss filled Yankee Stadium. The grief of more than 30,000 people who lost loved ones and colleagues in the World Trade centre attack found voice in a poignant but rousing prayer service in New York yesterday... The service started with a choral rendition of the Battle Hymn of the Republic followed by invocation from the Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Sikh and Hindu clerics present. Prayers were said in languages from English to Hebrew, Spanish to Arabic.

WHAT DO WE THINK ?

It was good that the Talibans were defeated. Consequences of their victory would have been too dreadful to imagine. What a pity that America did not have to pay price in terms of lives of U S Soldiers. More about this event in the next newsletter.

1.5 The BBC and Islam

BBC2 showed a series entitled Empire of Faith In July 2001. Here is some criticism of the series. On 22 August 2001, in the Daily Mail, in the Letters to the Editor column we found a letter by Keith Matheson of Cardiff. He wrote :-

" TV critic Peter Paterson was spot-on about the BBC series of programmes on Islam. It went to town to promote Islam as a caring and tolerant religion, but it didn't show the other side of the coin.

Could it not have mentioned that in Saudi Arabia it is forbidden for Christians to worship in public. In Indonesia, Christians have been forced out of their homes, slaughtered or forced to convert to Islam. In Afghanistan, a group of Christians is under threat for sharing their faith with Moslems.

I have no objection to Moslems practising their faith in this country, and I abhor the abuse that is sometimes directed against them. But theseprogrammes did not show the true face of Islam."

1.6 Indian rail is better

It is rare for the British newspapers to publish anything good about India. We were therefore surprised that on 22 October 2001 Metro, the London paper published a letter by M Nathan. He says

" I wonder if Pamela Johnson ( Metro 18 Oct ) has ever actually been to a Third World country and experienced their transport system. May be she should, before immediately assuming that the 'integrated transport system' here is automatically better.

Given the resources that are available, the cheap price of tickets ( by local standards ) and the sheer number of people who use the local rail services and bus services in Mumbai, the authorities there are have achieved nothing short of a stellar service.

Although it may be more crowded, the people are more accommodating and do not cling on to their personal space, without any consideration of the inconvenience to their fellow passengers.

While the passengers in Mumbai have endured years of crowded trains, the service these days is reliable enough to ensure they can reach their destination on time. That is no mean accomplishment considering the drivers of some of these trains have been victims of the violence of irate passengers in the past."

2. AROUND LONDON TOUR OF PLACES ASSOCIATED WITH INDIAN FREEDOM FIGHTERS

Slide shows

Dr Agarkar of Kalyan, Maharashtra, conducts slide shows of Godbole's Special tour

He conducted a show at Tilak Mandir, Bhiwandi on December 13, 2001. It is an old establishment functioning from 1920. He was told Lokmanya Tilak visited this place before 1920. The slide show went very well. 30 people attended.

Agarkar also made another show in a school in Bhandup, Mumbai in January 2002.

3 Historical Findings : Memorial to Sir Curzon Wyllie

On 1 July 1909, Madanlal Dhingra, a contemporary of Veer Savarkar shot and killed Sir Curzon Wyllie, Political A.D C to Secretary of State for India. Godbole had emphasised for a long time that Wyllie was a very high ranking British officer and that a tablet was placed in his honour in St Paul's Cathedral, London. Godbole happened to visit this Cathedral recently and found that the tablet does indeed exist in the crypt of St Paul's, about 20 feet from where Nelson is buried. It is about 6 by 4 foot and depicts Wyllie's head with decorations. It reads

To the Glory of God

And in lasting memory of

LT COL SIR WILLIAM HUTT CURZON WYLLIE, KCIE, CVD

Younger son of General Sir William Wyllie, GCB

Born October 5th 1848. Assassinated July 1st 1909

while attending an assembly of his Indian fellow subjects

at the Imperial Institute in London.

This tablet is erected in sorrow and in love

by his friends.

Entering the Army in 1866 and the Indian Political

Department in 1879, he earned distinction in the

Afghan War of 1879-80, in Oudh, in Nepal, in

Central India and above all in Rajputana where

He rose to the highest rank in the Service. In

1901 he was chosen to be Political Aide-de-Camp

to the Secretary of State for India

Innocent of all offences.

A devoted public servant, courageous and gentle,

of a winning courtesy, and a constant self-denial.

He was loved by the Princes and people

and died as he had lived

in the Service of India

Jesus said I am the resurrection and life St

John XI 25

His servants shall serve Him, and they shall see his face Rev XXII 34

1869-1870

1866-1869

R.S.R

106

Bombay Light Infantry

In 1909, it was indeed a very high honour for such a tablet to be placed in the crypt of St Paul's

4 History today

4.1 Assimilation : Will it spell the end of the Jews ?

A very interesting article ( in three parts ) by Graham Turner appeared in The Daily Telegraph in April 2001. In part II he reports :-

'America is finishing Hitler's work', declared James Adelman, a Jewish lawyer who lives near Chicago. Like a good many other Jews, he is deeply worried by the steep decline and dilution of the Jewish community in the United States because so many young Jews are 'marrying out'. In the last three years, I haven't been to a single wedding where both partners were Jewish. I think the Jewish culture in America will simply disappear. ..

The sense of dismay is patent, and the statistics certainly look ominous. In America, six out of 10 Jews are marrying out. In Britain, it is as much as two thirds.

The consequences for the future in both countries are dire. ' where there's a mixed marriage' said Rabbi Ammiel Hirsch, who runs the World Union for progressive Jewry in New York, 'only 28 per cent of the children are raised as Jewish. In the next generation, a mere six per cent identify themselves as Jewish. So, in just two generations, you've eliminated the Jewish line.

Once, Jews who married out were severely stigmatised. Thirty years ago their parents would have killed them. Now, they don't even object.

In Britain, the Jewish community has fallen from 450,000 in the fifties to 260,000 today. In America, where the birth rate among all Jews is the lowest of any ethnic community, Jews now make up only 2 per cent of population, half of what it was 40 years ago.

There is no doubt that, in the years after the war, a great many British and American Jews were only too ready to dump religious practises that not only made no particular sense to them but also set them apart from the Gentile community. They wanted both accepted and successful.

Nor was that surprising. Even after the horrors of the Holocaust, they were still subjected to overt discrimination. In Britain, Jews were excluded from all manners of clubs and treated with disdain, particularly by the landed classes. In America, discrimination was far worse. Herman Obermayer remembers his family turning up in torrential rain at a motel in Maine where they had made a reservation, only to be turned away for being Jewish. " My father, who was the first Jewish president of Philadelphia Bar, just said : ' America has been very good to us - don't complain.' Ruth Bader Ginsburg, recalls signs outside bed-and breakfasts that said simply "no dogs or Jews."

Jewish students had the same humiliating experience. " I wanted to do a doctorate in chemistry at Columbia " said Norman Lamm, now head of the Yeshiva University in New York, " and went along for an interview with a professor who came from Tennessee. He didn't even ask me to sit down. 'What makes you people want to come to Columbia?' he snapped. 'You mean New York Jews?' I said. 'Yes,' he replied. So I took my application form, tore it up and threw it in his face."

A good many American Jews, however, did not stand on their dignity in the same way. In order to get on, they imitated gentile customs and neglected religious observance. Kosher went out of the window. There were Christmas trees and presents. Reform Synagogues in Britain installed organs and imported choirs, on the Christian pattern. In some American synagogues, worshippers were asked to take off their yarmulkes, the skullcaps Jews wear to show respect to God.

" Many of my parents' generation" said Adele Malpass, who is 39 " wanted to be part of America. They didn't want to be different. In fact, they were worried about being different because, at that time, a lot of baggage came with it. So, their religion was watered down until there was very little religion or tradition in it. It was a very sanitised version of Judaism.

The sense of crisis in both Britain and America is so profound that a minority of Jews have rebelled against what they perceive as the wishy-washiness of the parental generation. Some were afraid that their community could simply wither away and Jewish people become more observant when they feel insecure. Hence the revival of Orthodox Judaism in both countries.

Orthodox Jews make up only 10 -15 per cent of the Jewish community in America, compared with 60-65 per cent in Britain. The differences between the Orthodox version of Judaism and its Reform, Liberal and Conservative varieties, which account for the most of the rest, are enormous.

Orthodox Jews believe that the first five books of the Bible are God's word, and that's it. The liberal and Reform communities on the other hand, think it is a human and not divine document. The Orthodox have no choice but to conform to everything in those books, whereas others believe that Jews should study them and then do what their educated and enlightened consciences tell them to do.

That is only the most important of a vast range of differences. In Orthodox synagogues, men and women sit separately, with a mehitza, or barrier between them ; the rest worship together. Reform Judaism, which in America accounts for 45 per cent of synagogue - goers, has women rabbis, whereas Orthodox rabbis are invariably men. Orthodox Jews are strictly forbidden to marry out ; in American Reform synagogues, as many as a third of the families now include a non-Jewish parent.

For the Orthodox to be Jewish, you must either have a Jewish mother or one who has gone through an Orthodox conversion. Reform Rabbis in America, by co