Winnipeg Free Press

Winnipeg Free Press (Newspaper) - August 14, 1981, Winnipeg, Manitoba Winnipeg f by William Pfaff special to the free press Paris that tre haunting Western Europe just a few months has blown that it was even flesh and Bone is very a revisionist Nisi Al existed and still exists in it has existed in the reasons have everything to do with the Peculiar his tory and circumstances of those the French communist party eur communism on the other laughable even As it was pro As the Spanish a communist Jorge has Frances communists Are without doubt the most the most hypo and the most sinister of All the marginal status in they got their just which shows that history is not always the under the leadership of Georges emerged from the parliamentary elections no longer a major Force in French it now is it has four Cabinet by socialist indeed by socialist Conde this is a tactical to ensure the socialists against an Early the socialists do not need the communists to the a govern ment centrists and can no longer depend on the communists to split the left in times of it has always been a mystery Why people took seriously the French communists claim to solemnly put Forward in meetings be tween Georges Marchais and Italy Enrico the history of the French party is a chronicle of cynicism and the party has relished its cynicism As evidence of its dialectical its its Lack of Bourgeois it undermined the socialist govern ment of the popular the just As it betrayed its electoral Alliance with the socialists at the time of the 1978 parliamentary it accepted the Hitler Stalin pact of 1939 with barely a outlawed by the Dala Dier the French communists then approached marshal Petain in offering to Supply evidence for the notorious show staged that of the traitors of the third Leon Paul and they approached the Ger Man occupation authorities to have the communist Al Lowed to publish resistance heroes Only when Germany attacked Russia did the communist party to the Relief of its rank and file members join the they were Brave and effective in the and that is Why they ended the War with and the respect of the no communist As Sam White of the London Spectator has put they themselves a kind of institutionalized asset to Frances rulers in every in obedience to soviet they came to the governments they did so in the famous May events of in the 1978 parliamentary and they tried to do so this year when Georges Marchais stood As a rival presidential candidate to Francois their consistent purpose has been to dominate the working so As to be the most important party on the left and thus the most important opposition Force in the to be they must remain an authentic party of Industrial the new and inter Esting fact is that they Are losing this French workers to longer Are alienated and As they were in the iwo and 1940s increasingly they have been swept tip into the Gener Al and the communist party is losing their the Socia lists Are taking it away from the socialists have become the More convincing defenders of the working mans interest to have accomplished this is the greatest Success of Francois Mitterrand in this years and the justification of his stubborn strategy of keeping to the the membership of the French communist party today is younger than the socialist but it is turnover is there Are Many More a communists than communists in in the presidential election in 22 per cent of the voters under 24 voted and 23 per cent of those under Young people join the party but do not at the same the leadership in town and Village across the the hardworking network of militants upon whom the party must tends to be of the wartime these Are the men and women whose memories Are of the suffering and Solidarity of the break Likely now the party has to reestablish its claim on the almost certainly it will break with the socialist govern ment As soon As the government is in within a year or the new Mitterrand government is bound to find Ras government finds that it cannot deliver on the conflicting promises lightly made in Days of opposition and there probably will be worse than broken the socialist Effort to accelerate the Economy and create jobs will be and Job creation in the midst of International stagnation is not the socialists could find themselves with both inflation and unemployment at that moment their enemies will and among those enemies is Likely to be the communist telling the voters of the left that they have been betrayed by Bourgeois socialism and that Only communism offers the v the record of their own compromises italian party Leader Enrico Berlinguer above and French party Leader Georges Marchais left flirted with euro communist concept with their collaboration with the their claim to have been eur communists and friends of Revi will be shoved Down the memory and once again they will be Mili Tants and but their purpose will not be to Rule which even if it could be done would Only make trouble for their purpose will be to that dominant position on the left which they and from the Days of the liberation to the end of the this is their vital difference from the italian communist upon whom events have forced another the italians have found Faute de the sole plausible Force opposition in contemporary this has been a misfortune for Moscow even As it has frightened the Western it has shoved the italian communist party into because it has been the Only italian party since the War with the voting strength to offer a serious possibility of defeating the Christian the communist party has attracted ram beefs across the spectrum of the left and of to has been even against the will of Many of its into the nearest thing Italy has to a party of even of Middle class the socialists could have had that they were More successful than the communists in the first Post War but squandered their support in an Alliance first with the and in the with the Christian the re sult each time was a damaging schism in the Italy real the work in class and the leaders who came out of Mussolini jails and from the would probably have preferred another kind of like the French playing the classic communist game of proletarian and revolutionary Togliatti is Compromise yet even there has been a tradition in italian communism of a Palmiro the party joined the wartime coalition government in 1944 and swore allegiance to the the party Dis carded violence without even trying there is also an intellectual of Grams Ian revisionism and intellectual could never be said of French it is possible to argue that the italian communist party has been forced to become eur communism which is to say forced to emerge from sectarian ism and accommodate itself to the wide membership which came to and forced to assume a place in italian political life with in Many it is it is a party of and if it were in fact Ever to enter an italian democratic that these contradictions could break it in its eur communism has been thrust upon yet to be seen is whether events to come in Italy will validate what the italian comic unit party is As in reveal that eur communism and communism Are Sharon believes in draconian revenge new York times Jerusalem Ariel Isra Els new defence is a retired general who won military Fame in the 1950s and Early 1970s by leading fierce reprisal raids against Arab Vil Lages and refugee Camps in Jordan and As a political known to israelis As has served As prime minister Menachem begins agriculture minister and the cabinets staun Chest advocate of an aggressive Settle ment policy in the occupied West which is administered by the israeli As defence Sharon will have direct jurisdiction Over the occupied where the last begin government established 165 settlements in four Arik Sharon is a great Ezer his predecessor As de Fence wrote in his Book on the egyptian israeli moves toward in id follow him through fire and but political life has different begin has held the defence portfolio since Weizman re signed last Sharon was born in 1928 to russian immigrants in far a jewish cooperative settlement in what is now defence minister Ariel Sharon the Stocky former military commander led three armoured brigades across the Suez canal against the egyptian army in the 1973 Middle East War in one of israels most daring ventures on the in april 1980 he provoked a Contro Versy with his harsh criticism of israeli television news coverage of the occupied youre a gang of Sharon shouted at a camera Crew As it filmed settlers from Gaza demonstrating against government i terrorists successfully when i was in the and ill fight you successful the outburst prompted angry reactions by the israeli the English language Jerusalem Post labelled Sharon an enemy of saying that his attitude posed a Clear and present danger to israeli Liber yet Weizman said that in the course of his bitter political a deter mined Sharon tends to be Hind him a wide Swath of bitter ene disappointed sympathizers and fervent military historians describe Sharon As israels Pioneer tactician and Battle front Leader in retaliatory guerrilla in reaction to syrian Border attacks and terrorist infiltration from Jordan and Egypt in the Moshe then chief of advocated reprisal Sharon formed israels first commando unit in 1953 to carry out the unit consisting of veterans of the Independence War dressed in civilian began its Campaign with an assault on the jordanian Border town of Libya in october killing 69 half of them women and in an explosion that destroyed 45 the raid was in retaliation for the murder by terrorists from Jor Dan of an israeli woman and her two children in an israeli Village near Tel nearly two decades from 1969 to serving As the army commander responsible for occupied Gaza and waged a Tough Campaign against the terrorism then ram Pant roads were bulldozed through congested refugee Camps to gain Access for army patrols and thin out the Palestin Ian Arab the object was to civilians were and commando units were sent into civilian areas to Hunt Down and they subjected Many inhabitants to rough Anterro Many people in Gaza still speak of Sharon with a emerging a hero from the 1973 Sharon entered politics and won a seat in the israeli parliament with begins liked he soon resigned for a temporary emergency military a in 1975 he reentered poli this time As the special military adviser to prime minister Yitzhak Rabin of the labor Weizman said Sharon found himself in tight Straits in his search for political Refuge to run in the 1977 parliamentary Sharon approached various politicians and Par Weizman including some whose Outlook was not precisely identical with his finally Sharon formed his own party and won two he joined them to the liked bloc in Exchange for his appointment As minister of agriculture in the begin settling about jews among million arabs in the West Golan Heights and Gaza was the main task he i believe these settlements Are the strongest answer against this threat of having a second palestinian he Sharon and his second live on and operate a Small private ranch in the Southern they have two a third son was accidentally killed playing with his fathers pistol when he was eight years old in the Sharon first the sister of his second was killed in a car also in the Sharon Grandfather and begins father were close friends and zionists in and Sharon grandmother was the midwife at the birth of chem 7 last Sterling Lyon Arm wrestled the National press corps to the ground with a simple he built an elaborate ten chair stage set in the legislature and flooded it with television by doing so he con Vinced the press that sometime during the annual premiers meeting All ten would be available for which they never this Bill Bennett set up ten rather Moth eaten chairs in the basement of the Empress hotel but then had his press Secretary announce that there was no guarantee that any one except Bennett would sit in any of them to answer Pill Bennett had neither struck his colors in the face of the nor had he capitulated because of the Odds 15 reporters Lor every he had simply staked out some new rules in the game that is As old As the annual conference the conference sessions Are in the game the try to be caught by the reporters or the television cameras when they Are doing dignified things or making important statements and try to catch them when they Are going Embarrass ing things or making the wrong state this year the unseasonably warm Fred Cleverley weather for Victoria was on the Side of the since provincial pre Miers feel that they must at All times reflect respectability the ten were often the Only ones within camera Range wearing suits if the weather had been what they had every right to the respectable dress of the premiers would have made them All but invisible in the respectable lobby of the respectable Empress the and the Lack of hotel air conditioning caused even the respectable parti ters of afternoon Tea to shed their and in few pases their shirts As the premiers were easy to find no one was easier to find than Ontario Bill who dealt the Empress an unthinkable blow by checking out Al most before he had he and the entire Ontario delegation other space in one of the to air conditioned hotels in the perhaps Davis reasoned along with new Bru Swicks Richard hat he would get enough heat for siding with prime minister Trudeau against eight of his provincial perhaps he reasoned that he was entitled to an air conditioned hotel room no matter How few there since Davis was no longer living in the main conference hotel his comings and goings provided More opportunities than Ever for the is Strong press corps to pry words out of his not that they really had to within hours of the conference a few copies of latest letter to Ottawa on the Economy mysteriously surfaced in the press the staff responsible for press Liaison went into High gear to reproduce enough copies for Davis made Bis one that turned out to be Worth More than he had hoped when the premiers failed to produce a single communique pm any subject after a full Day of other premiere were my icing As they Caine out of the sessions in twos and making it impossible to get arguments started Between had they attended the scheduled news coffin Erenies they might have been put in the position of getting Stafij the sane arguments to Public that they Haj Gose through to the press corps adjusted rather Quicy to the new rules availabilities were it is often easier for a strange reporter to gain Access to a Premier whom he does not meet regularly because the politicians feel tired that he is important enough to warrant attention from several such requests for interviews went in and were promptly Sev eral premiers were surprised to discover that while they had agreed to meet a strange reporter the one who walked in was More than familiar to these skirmishes made the press secretaries harder to some re porters used old they let it slip that an unfavourable Story was in the then relaxed with their feet up like fishermen that get a bite on every cast they had Only to wait for the arrival of the appropriate Secretary at their More often than not the aide was put of breath As he made the enquiries about the potential bad publicity his Boss was about to radio and television Crews circled like vultures but were numerous enough to resemble flocks of the Canadian broadcasting Corpora Tion without its striking technicians managed to put 33 people in the the Csc had no technicians but the other electronic news gathering Agen cues did television camera operators fell Over sound and lighting techno producers bumped script Assis Tants and everywhere were the careful by makeup Nair these were the people who must have been really thankful that the premiers decided to remain in their business suit the suits became insurance for guaranteed television no mat Ter what a camera May have been from a hanging Flower pot to a reporters interpretation of the minute a suit appeared on the Steps of the legislature the Lens was swung if it and if it wore a it had to be a Premier Sqq Tisbury a ;