Washington Post distracts when referencing the Alan Gross case
By Arturo Lopez Levy
From The Havana Note
From its title “Cuba’s Jewish hostage”, the Washington Post editorial of last Tuesday, December 7, about the situation of Alan Gross is an unfortunate distraction. It is more of the same politics without policy that kept Gross in prison for the last year while good opportunities of improving the bilateral relations between Cuba and the United States only deteriorated.
The editorial begins by attacking the attendance of Cuban president Raul Castro at the celebration of Hanukah with the Cuban Jewish Community as a mere charade to hide the injustice of Alan Gross’ detention without charge. It barely mentions Gross’ connection with the State Department USAID, without a single reference to the regime change declared goal of the program under which he was sent to Cuba. It finishes eulogizing the Obama’s administration decision to put further improvement of relations with Cuba on hold while pressing for Gross’ release.
Let’s be clear: from a Human Rights perspective, nothing justifies the Cuban government violation of Gross’ rights to a due process. The American government and society must not remain passive while witnessing the tragedy of the Gross family selling their home, and facing the chemotherapy treatment of his daughter without the presence of the father. The Gross family should not pay for the 50 years of conflict between the United States and Cuba or the absence of fair and impartial trial guarantees, denounced by Amnesty International and the UN Group for Arbitrary Detentions, for the five Cubans condemned in Miami for infiltrating anti-Castro groups there.
But Gross is not “a Jewish hostage”. Clearly, he is a Jew and Jews, with a history of captivity, solidarity and redemption, care about the terrible tragedies that have hurt Allan Gross and his family. But his current situation is not the result of anti-Jewish Cuban policies.
Every year, Cuba welcomes thousands of Jews from the United States who assist and support their brothers and sisters in faith. Some of these visitors take books, magazines, computer equipment, phones, medicines and other supplies to their fellow Jews and the Cuban people in general. In Havana, there is a Jewish education program managed by the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee to attract the Jewish youth to its culture. There is also an ORT computer lab to educate and connect the Cuban Jews in the island and with communities all over the globe.
Cuba has dynamics that have nothing to do with the United States. Raul Castro’s visit to the synagogue Beth Shalom to celebrate Hanukah was not a surprise. Religious groups defeated the atheistic projects of the communist regime and recovered significant social space. Instead of resisting this trend, the government accommodated the religious revival. Communities of faith are not bothered as long as they do not become conduits for political opposition or foreign meddling in internal affairs. Since 1992, the relations between the government and the religious communities steadily improved.
If Raul Castro’s visit to the synagogue attempted to clarify that Cuba is not hostile to the Jews, he was simply showing a reality. The relations between the Cuban government and the Jewish organizations have significantly improved since last summer. In mid June, many Cuban Jews, including some leaders, were angered by Fidel Castro’s June 10 article in which he vilely compared the IDF raid on the Gaza-bound flotilla with the Jewish holocaust and the Israeli flag with the swastika.
The situation changed radically in September. Fidel Castro declared that Israel “without a doubt” has a right to exist and criticized Iranian President Ahmadinejad for his Holocaust denial. Fidel Castro said he understood how the unique character of Jewish suffering was shaping the decision-making of Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu towards Iran’s nuclear program. The Israeli Foreign Ministry shared Castro’s statements, using it as a demonstration of how an icon of the world’s radical left and the non-aligned movement, both of which have tried to de-legitimize Israel, opposed an annihilationist view against Israel. President Shimon Peres referred to Cuba-Israel relations in a grateful letter to Castro: “Your words are like a surprising bridge between a harsh reality and a new horizon.”
A Gross tragedy
The Washington Post editorial distracted an honest discussion about Gross’ arrest in Cuba. The editorial even omitted the important fact that the leaders of two of Havana’s synagogues declared they were never informed by Mr. Gross of his activities and link with the U.S government.
Gross was not arrested for helping the Jewish community or for being Jewish but because of his illegal work for the USAID in Cuba. The Cuba programs of USAID are not regular programs of the otherwise respectable development agency. The programs were approved under section 109 of the Helms-Burton Law, with the declared purpose of imposing a regime change in Cuba following an American diktat. Alan Gross, an international development expert, was hired to be part of a regime change policy. According to one of the architects of this dangerous amalgam of civil society building and regime change semi-covert action, former Secretary for Hemispheric Affairs, Roger Noriega, the purpose of it was to create “chaos” and “instability” in Cuba. Why didn’t the Washington Post mention these facts?
The last thing Alan Gross needs is to become another hostage of those promoting the U.S policy that brought him to his captivity. Gross’ release will be advanced not by more hostility but by political negotiations and humanitarian gestures. The United States should replace its policy of regime change by imposition with one of change through détente, so that most Americans may freely travel to Cuba and bring information to the Cuban people through the front door, rather than on a risky semi-covert government-funded mission. Instead of creating distractions, the Washington Post should hear the plea of Judith Gross, to change the bilateral relations, and do not make Alan’s case an excuse to fall further apart, but rather an example of a new era in U.S.–Cuba relations.
