BOMBING

In 1980, I was working for a small publishing house called The

Pilgrim Press.  My task was to acquire and edit social justice books. 

Very quickly I took a crash course in book publishing.  I

learned that every year in the fall an international book fair was held

in Frankfurt, where rights to books were sold. 

Pilgrim Press, the country’s oldest publishing house, was owned by a

liberal church group, the United Church of Christ.  The head of the

publishing arm was a Protestant minister, a man named Paul Sherry. 

Paul loved books, and had the idea of creating a trade book division

of social justice issues in line with the institution’s beliefs.  I’d had a

brief stint at Simon and Schuster working for Alice Mayhew, editor of

social justice books there (including Woodward

and Bernstein  In my job interview Paul and I talked a lot about ethics

and  books, and he hired me.  Though I made it clear I didn’t know

much about the book business.

I told him about Frankfort, and he suggested I go.

I had traveled some by then- the Middle East, much of Europe,

but I was reluctant, for reasons of history, to go to Germany.

To make the trip easier, I flew to Paris, where I had a small group of

friends.  My friends were Jewish, or partly.  All Marxists too, none of

them had ever been inside a synagogue.

I am not a shul goer either, but I’d heard about a beautiful Reform

synagogue on Rue Copernic.  It was shabbat, and I thought the

service would be palatable for everyone so I suggested

we all go.  My friends were reluctant.  Why would they want to

go to a synagogue?

‘

Still I talked them into it and the night we were there, the synagogue

was bombed. They’d been ambivalent about seeing themselves as

Jews – all Marxists first, by choice, they left the synagogue redefined.

Four people were killed outside the synagogue:  an Israeli journalist, a

student, a cab driver, and a janitor.  The Prime Minister, Raymond

Barre, caused outrage and protests when he said,

“This odious attack was aimed at hitting Israelites going to the

synagogue but hit innocent French people.” He never apologized.

This week a Lebanese sociology professor Hassan Diab was convicted

of murder for the bombing.  Diab, living in Canada educated at

Syracuse University, was sentenced to a life in prison.

Diab claims innocence. The Canadian government has not

decided whether or not to extradite him.

Over the years, I have thought about this bombing very often, and

about the countless people throughout history who have witnessed

inexplicable tragedies.

After the bombing, I called a man I was seeing in New York – a

sensitive, funny Armenian film editor, to talk about what happened. 

You don’t have to go to Frankfurt he said.

You have a good excuse to come home.

Shaken, still I went.  It was a hard Frankfurt week.

Returning home, I didn’t know how to

understand what happened. Hearing news this week

of the conviction forty three years later,

I still don’t know how to piece the story together.

Except for this.  When I returned home from a difficult two weeks,

the funny Armenian was waiting in my apartment. 

Marry me he said.  I did.