By now, she has apologized for these comments on her website and has also resigned her position with Hearst Corporation. In addition, her speaking agency, Nine Speakers, has also dissociated itself from her. There should be no way for her to recover from this unacceptable comment.
Some may argue that this was not an anti-Semitic comment and that she was merely expressing her opposition to Israeli policies. There are even representatives of Jewish organizations who have accepted her apology. That argument falls flat. This supposed icon of journalism has either lost her filter with age and was merely expressing what she has always thought, or erroneously assumed that she was untouchable because of her age, years of experience and position. Both her comments and her history clearly reveal that these comments represent her true anti-Semitic sentiments.
First of all, her words obviously demonstrate her belief that the state of Israel should not exist at all. This had nothing to do with Israel’s policies, but displayed an opposition to the mere existence of the state of Israel. If her remarks were clearly a criticism of Israeli policy, they would have been completely acceptable. However, they were not meant in such a limited way. Her comments reveal contempt for all of the Jewish people of Israel, including those who themselves or whose families immigrated from Europe, those whose families have lived in the land of Israel for generations and those who were expelled from the surrounding Arab countries during and after the establishment of the State of Israel. It is clear that Thomas’ expression of anti-Israel sentiment is not new. She has a long history of questioning everything that Israel does in its’ own defense, including advocating the “Hezbollah point of view” with Tony Snow during a White House press conference in 2006 during Israel’s second Lebanon War, and more recently comparing Israel’s incursion into Gaza during late 2008 and early 2009 in response to thousands of rocket attacks on Israeli civilians, to atrocities perpetrated by Nazi Germany. http://jewishworldreview.com/cols/thomas060810.php3
Additionally, her comments clearly show the depth of her anti-Israel and anti-Semitic leanings. She is a woman who is not ignorant of history. There can be no way that she is unaware of the Holocaust or the suffering of the Jewish people in Poland and Germany. She cannot be unaware of the existence of concentration camps in those two countries where Nazi Germany tried and almost successfully carried out its’ Final Solution. She also must remember, first-hand, much of the history of modern Israel since she was born in 1920 and most certainly followed much of the news as it was occurring. Unbelievably, she argued that Jews in Israel should return to the countries where six million of their family members and their people were cruelly and efficiently slaughtered. She wants Jews to return to Poland, where 90% of the pre- WWII Jewish population was systematically slaughtered by the Germans. Unbelievable! I, as the daughter of a Holocaust survivor, cannot even enter the German pavilion at Epcot Center in Florida, without being exceedingly uncomfortable. Her comments display a deep insensitivity to these horrible facts and in some way almost condone what occurred there. According to Helen, Jews should live anywhere except in Israel, their ancestral home.
As a Christian of Arab descent, Thomas is most likely schooled in both the New and Old Testaments. She is thus clearly aware of the Jewish historical presence in the land of Israel, including the birth and death of Jesus Christ in Israel. How can she ignore this history? The ONLY possible explanation is a deep-seated anti-Semitism.
Finally, I wonder why this administration waited so long to comment on Thomas’ ugly utterance. If she had made a similar anti-Black comment, would the White House have waited so long to opine on her comments? I doubt it, considering the President’s history of jumping the gun and speaking out on current events without being cognizant of all of the facts, such as the Gates-Boston police affair. Is blatant anti-Semitism acceptable in all of ugliness, but a probable innocent police mistake involving an African American completely unacceptable? While this is apparently the case in our country's current frame of mind, it is not acceptable to me and should not be acceptable to anyone in our great country.
Here is a link to an interesting article that has raised some of the same concerns that I did. American Thinker: Shouldn't We All Be Israelis Now?
*UPDATE* June 10, 2010
Rabbi Nessenof, of RabbiLive.com, who originally interviewed Helen Thomas when she clearly exposed her virulent antisemitism has been receiving hateful e-mails and threats for daring to bring Thomas' comments to the attention of the wider world. http://www.rabbilive.com/RabbiLIVE/Home.html
*UPDATE* June 11, 2010
Helen Thomas hailed as a hero by Hezbollah. No surprise there.
http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/Media/arab-press-hezbollah-praise-helen-thomas-courage/story?id=10882155
*UPDATE* June 15, 2010
Here is a terrific opinion piece published in Ha'aretz:
http://www.haaretz.com/jewish-world/dear-helen-thomas-we-jews-aren-t-getting-the-hell-out-of-anywhere-anymore-1.295308
Below is a link to an interview with Rabbi Nessenof that shows his extreme surprise at being exposed to the virulent antisemitism that Helen Thomas spouted in response to his question. I have also included some excerpts from the interview.
http://newsbusters.org/blogs/brad-wilmouth/2010/06/13/rabbi-who-outed-helen-thomas-liberal-who-opposed-iraq-war-reevaluatin
HOWARD KURTZ: Did you have any idea when you took out that video camera and asked Helen Thomas that question that she was hostile toward Israel?
RABBI DAVID NESENOFF, RABBILIVE.COM: I didn’t approach her thinking that. Now that I see a lot of things in the news, I certainly can review and see that she’s had a lot of different thoughts, but, of course, there might be anti-Israel or pro-Palestinian. That’s very different than anti-Semitic and anti-Jewish and wanting to cleanse a piece of land, so, up until this point, this is just an individual who is pro-Palestinian. People should look out for the Palestinian rights. Everybody should look out for everybody’s rights, and there’s nothing wrong with that.
KURTZ: As you know, Helen Thomas has been a longtime institution here in the capital, she’s a heroine to many female journalists, and some people are blaming you for ending her career.
NESENOFF: Yeah, you know, I received about 25,000 hate mail, you know, emails, and, more shocking than even that, is the hate media that I’m beginning to learn about – you know, from TV and newspapers and blogs and talk shows and entertainers, and they’re accusing me of being some right-wing ambusher, and have to, it kind of rocked my world a little because I have to kind of reevaluate my life and my standing and the agendas because, yeah, I’m a New York Democrat Jewish liberal supporter of Obama, donated to his candidacy for a year, said give him a chance, give him a chance, defended, watched all these liberal media, and now I have to reevaluate totally, I have to speak, I have to now speak to people with all different agendas because if I was part of a team where their agenda was that Israel and the Jewish people don’t have a connection – which is exactly what Helen Thomas said – that there’s no connection, why are they even there-
KURTZ: Well, let me interrupt you. What do you mean when you say "hate media"? I mean, obviously, you find yourself in the middle of this firestorm. Do you feel that journalists, programs, commentators have been personally unfair to you? And can you explain how?
NESENOFF: You know, I find people that don’t cover the story or people that cover the story are so upset they don’t know what to do, so they have to attack me and find, maybe we’ll say he did something on purpose or he filmed it a certain way, or we’ll find out what did he do in his past. I mean, they don’t know what to do with it, but why don’t they actually ask me and find out maybe I liked Helen Thomas and I was actually for the fact that she went ahead and spoke to President Bush and said, you know, watch it with the Iraq War, although now I understand – and we have to reevaluate – that maybe what she then was protesting the Iraq War, I was saying that because I didn’t want our soldiers to be in harm’s way. And it turns out she didn’t want the Iraqis to be in harm’s way. So we have to, kind of, I have to really reevaluate liberal and conservative and really find out where I stand because I think I’ve been a little blind.
KURTZ: Well, I have to say you asked her the least loaded question of all time: "Any thoughts on Israel?" On the other hand, you find yourself now questioning whether the media can be fair, particularly on this sort of charged issue involving the Middle East. You clearly feel put upon.
NESENOFF: Sure, look, I didn’t hear anybody speak about instead of reviewing Helen’s career, why don’t we review all the things she reported on and see how it was affected by what she said about Israel and the Jewish people not having any connection, what are they doing there? So now when you start with that core that they have no, you know, relationship, now we should back up and look through what she’s been telling the American public.
KURTZ: What about all this electronic hate mail – you’ve posted some of these on your Web site talking about dirty Jews and Hitler – what’s your reaction to all of this ugliness that you seem to have inadvertently unleashed?
NESENOFF: Right, you know, it’s interesting because RabbiLive.com has on it some really uncensored material right now that’s very strong. What it does, first of all, it stops a lot of times people from sending hate mail. It shows us what’s on people’s minds out there. And it has caused a lot of beautiful Christians and Jews and people throughout the entire world all over to send beautiful mail saying, "Hey, don’t get the wrong idea. There are great people and wonderful people in this country and there are great people around the world who love the Jewish people, that understand there is a connection between the Jews and Israel, we will not deny that," and so there’s a mixed bag, it’s kind of some good feelings have come out of it also. Certainly the security issues are being taken care of.
KURTZ: I’m glad there’s a positive aspect as well. I’ve got about half a minute. What was your personal reaction when you found out that Helen Thomas had resigned as a result of you videotaping?
NESENOFF: I have absolutely no issue or relationship with Helen Thomas. My relationship is with justice, integrity and honesty, and with Israel, and the fact that the Jewish people and Israel have a relationship and that anybody that denies the relationship cannot begin the communication and the conversation about how to deal with the other problems. How can we talk about Gaza or east Jerusalem or Golan or anything else anybody wants to talk about if the core issue of Jews in Israel is denied? And Jeff Goldberg said it, that our existence isn’t even around.
Read more: http://newsbusters.org/blogs/brad-wilmouth/2010/06/13/rabbi-who-outed-helen-thomas-liberal-who-opposed-iraq-war-reevaluatin#ixzz0qx57XU5B
No comments:
Post a Comment