1 Germany No Threat, Israel Says

Foreign Minister Moshe Arens, in a departure from recent Israeli statements, has said his nation need not fear a democratic, united Germany.

In remarks broadcast by Israel Radio on Wednesday, Arens said no Jew could think about German reunification without remembering the Nazi Holocaust in which 6 million Jews were exterminated during World War II.

But he said: “If that united Germany is a democratic Germany . . . fully conscious of the responsibilities that it has toward the Jewish people, a country that will contribute to strengthening democracy throughout the world, then I don’t think that there’s a danger to be concerned about.”

The statement was in sharp contrast to remarks by Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir last November that the prospect of a united Germany was a grave concern for the Jewish people.

Meanwhile, Rabbi Marvin Hier, chairman of the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles, asked to meet with the leaders of West and East Germany to discuss “the great fear that German reunification brings to the community of victims of Nazism.”