FROM OUR ARCHIVES

50 YEARS AGO March 4, 1968

The Israeli Vintners’ Association urged the adoption of legislation obliging local distillers to use only grape alcohol. There was a 7,000-ton surplus of wine grapes that year. Regulations issued by the Agriculture Ministry requiring the exclusive use of grape alcohol in locally made liquors was earlier overturned by the High Court.

The Agriculture Ministry was planning how to absorb a large part of the West Bank’s agricultural output following reports that the Jordanians might stop farm produce from crossing the river. According to the plans, the bulk of West Bank produce would be re-channeled for processing in Israel’s fruit and vegetable canning industries. The farmers would also be encouraged to concentrate on specific crops, such as chickpeas and sesame seeds, which commanded good prices in Israel. In addition, ministry instructors sold them on the idea of raising some 60,000 dunams (6,000 hectares) of “Florence” wheat which yielded more than three times the grain their old “hard wheat” seeds used to yield. The instructors had a hard time convincing the fellaheen (Arab farmers) that the flour from their own grain was not of superior quality, and the day was only won following a pita baking contest with some of their wives pitting their grain against the “Florence” wheat. The Israeli pita won. 25 YEARS AGO March 4, 1993

The Knesset labor and social affairs committee hoped to convince the IDF to replace 1,000 reservists with the unemployed. The unemployed would receive three months of training before serving another nine months. The proposal would save the government the money otherwise paid in unemployment benefits and compensation for reserve duty.

Six people who underwent blood tests at hospital AIDS-detection centers were carriers of the then-fatal disease, but were unaware of it because they hadn’t returned to get the results, health minister Haim Ramon disclosed. The ministry, he promised, would do its utmost to find them, including putting notices in the press. The revelation followed a well-publicized incident in which a 23-year-old drug addict-turned-prostitute learned she had been an AIDS carrier for more than two years. She did not return to the hospital to get the initial results, and little effort was made to locate her. Since then, she had sex with “thousands” of men. Ramon instructed ministry officials to set up a committee to study location procedures of AIDS carriers to prevent this from reoccurring. 15 YEARS AGO March 4, 2003

Interior minister Avraham Poraz promised that he would no longer impede the sale of non-kosher meat by dispatching inspectors to butcher shops. Permits permitting the sale of non-kosher meat had always been given out by local councils, which could restrict them based on the wants of the local population. The Interior Ministry’s plans would apparently make it easier to receive a permit.

The Pentagon announced that it would allow the Israel Defense Forces unprecedented access to a highly classified military communications network during the upcoming US operations in Iraq. The American administration was hoping that this access would dispel any suspicions the IDF might have during the conflict, and thus avoid any preemptive action by the IDF. – Daniel Kra