The Jewish Week - 03.05.2004

 

 

 

 

The Jewish Week

A Little Love From Georgia

Stewart Ain 

Talk about buttering up an audience. 

The new president of Georgia, fresh from a meeting with President George W. Bush, wowed members of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations when he met with them here last week and said he considered this his most important meeting. 

“I’m meeting with people representing moral authority,” Mikhail Saakashvili told the group on Thursday. “I know what an important role you play consolidating different Jewish groups, underscoring the role of Israel for mankind, establishing universal human values and enhancing world peace. … Every Georgian will tell you we love Jews.” 

Saakashvili, 36, who was inaugurated Jan. 25 two months after the bloodless ouster of veteran president Eduard Shevardnadze, spoke of being educated at Columbia University and the major influence several Jewish professors had on his life. He pointed out also that accompanying him to the meeting were several U.S.-educated members of his cabinet, and that the mother of his prime minister is Jewish. 

“We need to establish relations with the U.S. Jewish community because you understand better than many in this country the international repercussions with the rest of the world,” he said. “I want your help in having better relations with the United States. … We are a small nation but an interesting, warm, hospitable and skillful one with talented people. We want to make this country work.” 

Georgia’s economy has been wracked with corruption and Saakashvili, Europe’s youngest leader, said he has started to “crack down on corruption” and is working to make the country free of crime and violence. 

Saakashvili, who was elected in January with 96.6 percent of the vote, asked the Jewish leaders’ support in “bringing people to Georgia” — tourists and investors — and in helping to strengthen the 10,000-strong Jewish community in his country. 

“We don’t want anybody to have any remorse or the slightest reservation that something would be wrong with any one Jew in Georgia,” he said. 

Asked about the situation in Israel, Saakashvili said he knows some Palestinians who want to make peace, but added, “We are also dealing with fanatics, and there can be no compromise when dealing with fanatics. You can’t lie to yourself [and believe] that you can make peace with terrorists.” 

Regarding the International Court of Justice’s deliberations over the legality of the security barrier Israel is building to keep out terrorists, Saakashvili said that some of the judges on the court are “very good” and that there “should be an understanding of Israel’s right to defend itself.” Its decision, he said, should be “based on a humanitarian understanding.” 

“That society is so open,” he said of Israel. “I admire it greatly. All the time I am telling my friends … we have to learn from Israel.” 

As he left the meeting, Mark Levin, executive director of the National Conference on Soviet Jewry, was heard to remark about Saakashvili’s effusive praise of the Jewish people, “We ought to bottle this guy.”