ROSH HASHANAH EDITION SECTION A PAGE 12-13
Hollywood celebrities aside, Abe Foxman might very well be the most recognizable American Jew there is.
Popes, princes, presidents, prime ministers, publishers and potentates have his number on their quick dial. When the issue is racism or discrimination, Foxman is invariably their go-to guy. He has the information and, without fail, the answers they seek.
He also has the experience. Foxman, 73, joined the Anti-Defamation League in 1965, pretty much fresh out of law school, and has never left. His 48 years at the organization constitute almost half of its 100 years, a centennial the ADL is marking this year.
In 1987 Foxman was named national director of the ADL and since then his name has become virtually synonymous with the organization.
He is undeniably an important man but one would never gather that from interviewing him. He is friendly and down-to-earth in a distinctly Yiddish and heimisch way that suggests he doesn’t take himself terribly seriously, although he takes his work very seriously indeed.
On a recent swing through Denver to lead a gathering of regional ADL directors from throughout the US, Foxman was asked how it all started.
As a young man — not very long after being saved from the Holocaust by a Polish Gentile — he realized he wanted to be a lawyer. As a graduate student, he knew that he didn’t want to work in corporate or government law, but was still unclear as to his professional destination.
About that time, his father, who was fluent in several languages, happened to be asked by the ADL to translate a number of letters the organization had received after publishing a paper defending the record of Pope Pius during WW II.
The letters, in Hebrew and Yiddish, were definitely angry and distinctly anti-ADL, Foxman recalls with a chuckle. His father, apparently too busy, turned the job over to his son, also multilingual, who gladly took on the assignment.
Foxman’s work would result soon after in a permanent job at ADL.
He misses neither the humor nor the irony in his first professional brush with the organization he would ultimately devote his life to. Nor does he diminish his conviction that he is a very lucky man for having hooked up with the ADL.
In his Aug. 13 interview with the Intermountain Jewish News, Foxman expounded on such personal matters, and considerably more.
First of all, happy birthday from one centenarian to another centenarian.
It’s nice to be able to say happy birthday (laughter).
What are your reflections on 100 years of the Anti-Defamation League?
The good news is we look back and the good old days were not the good old days, and we changed a lot of it.
I think the disappointing news is that we’re still here. And the fact that I cannot promise my grandchildren that they will not need an Anti-Defamation League.
So it’s mixed. We debated what to do. Do we celebrate? Do we commemorate? The answer is both. This is changed but this is still out there.
I guess from your perspective the looking back is very important. What you’ve published, what you’ve said, etc. For us, when we struggled with the message, the message we were looking for is a message for the future. We came up with “Imagine a World Without Hate,” which I don’t think we would have even dared to wish 100 years ago.
So it’s exciting that we’re in a position where this is the vision. Maybe we’ll get there. It’s exciting because it’s hopeful, it says the future will be better. Look, if we didn’t believe in epiphanies we wouldn’t be in business.
An anthropologist might suggest that things like racism or anti-Semitism are almost genetic; that they date back to when Cro-Magnons and Neanderthals were hitting each other with clubs. I assume you do not share that point of view.
No, we do not. We do not think you’re born a bigot. You are taught to be a bigot. It’s easier to be taught than to be untaught.
But I saw a “60 Minutes” segment which examined children, three or five months old. It started with the issue: Are we born with knowing the difference between the moral value of good and evil? From there, they went to: Are we born with prejudice?
After watching this, I’m going to reach out to these Yale professors and look at the studies. They found something which is somewhat disturbing in the sense that at the age of three and five months, 80% of the tots reached out with an affinity — that is, with the like — for one bowl of cereal over another.
Then they had two dolls — same color, same dolls — and the dolls were made to reach out for a certain bowl of cereal. Then they gave the infants the opportunity to pick the doll they wanted. Over 80% picked the doll that chose their choice of cereal.
At that early age, there was this bias. You know, wow!
We’re not going to find a vaccine against prejudice. However, being an optimist — and I am an optimist — if we continue to map the human genes, maybe we’ll identify something in those DNA particles.
You know my background. I survived the Holocaust because there was this lady, a Catholic woman, who risked her life to save me. She wasn’t a great intellectual. She didn’t weigh the risks because if she weighed the risks somebody else would be sitting here.
At the same time, some of her neighbors were collaborators, most were bystanders and a few stood up. What made her stand up and do what she did? What is it?
My hope is that maybe we’ll be able to map the DNA to find out what makes people stand up and have courage.
A theologian might counter the anthropologist by saying that it is part of our duty to transcend our genetics, to rise above our animalistic natures.
It’s nice to talk about an antidote, but what we’ve been about is trying to find the levers that will get good people. We start with the belief that the majority of people are good, however you define that; that all we have to do is find the levers, the buttons to get good people to stand up.
If you ask me what the ADL is all about, to me that’s it. How do you get people to stand up and say no to bullying, no to prejudice, no to discrimination, no to anti-Semitism?
The history of Hitler’s rise is not esoteric. There were so many occasions where the German people could have stopped him, could have said no. So it’s not inevitable. The Holocaust was not inevitable, but there weren’t enough levers to get people to say no.
And we know that in every place in the world, wherever good people stood up to say no, Jews lived, Gypsies lived, gays lived, Christians lived.
So it did work. I’m living proof.
We don’t have the right to be pessimistic about good and evil.
Are we entering an era, or are we already in an era, where it’s becoming more difficult to distinguish anti-Semitism from something that isn’t or may not be? By way of example: the shechitah ban in Poland and other places, the circumcision struggles, Roger Waters’ recent concert, which I believe you had something to say about, even the boycott Israel movement.
Is it harder now than say 20 years ago to say, yes, that’s anti-Semitic, or no it’s not?
For me it’s not. I think it’s a little harder because everything is out there because of the Internet. Everything is debated, everything has a platform and a following, everything can be reinterpreted.
Not every person opposed to shechitah is an anti-Semite, but I would venture to say that every anti-Semite is opposed to shechitah.
I take a look. One needs to examine what motivates the PETA people. I don’t think it’s anti-Semitism.
With your example of Mr. Waters, he is an equal opportunity offender. He doesn’t like any symbols, doesn’t like any isms, doesn’t like religions. A while back, when he was doing all kinds of shtick, we had an issue where the dollar sign followed the Star of David. I said, ‘If you mix it up, where the dollar sign sometimes follows the crescent or the cross, OK.’ He got the message.
He’s anti-Israel in a very extreme way. He doesn’t like a lot of things in our establishment. That doesn’t necessarily make him anti-Semitic.
This whole question of are you or aren’t you, can you criticize Israel and not be an anti-Semite — the answer is yes, but you have look at the whole gestalt.
Again, for me to test is not that difficult. If you want to utilize the vehicle of boycott to strengthen human rights, civil rights, respect, G-d bless you.
If you come up with a list of 10 countries, which would have China, Cuba, Saudi Arabia and you include Israel, and you boycott those institutions or corporations that are involved in these countries, I would argue that Israel doesn’t belong there. Unlike China or Saudi Arabia or Turkey, you have a Supreme Court, you have a gay rights movement.
But I would still say to you that if you include Israel in that list, OK. But if it’s only Israel then you’re an anti-Semite.
I reject the title of apartheid because they stretch it and distort it, but if they apply that title to 10 countries that somehow act out apartheid and Israel is one of them, OK.
But if Israel is the only country that you apply that to, you’re an anti-Semite.
If Zionism is the only national liberation movement that you’re opposed to, or if Israel is the only state that you think is racist or apartheid, you’re an anti-Semite.
For the majority of them, Zionism is the only nationalism they don’t like.
If John Kerry has his fondest wish and in nine months the PA and Israel sign a peace agreement, would that scenario at all affect the way some of these anti-Israeli/anti-Zionist/anti-Jewish attitudes are reflected?
I’m an optimist so I would hope that for some it would. Take the example of Sharon and disengagement. That changed the attitudes of Europe — for a couple of months. And then it went back.
It would change it for awhile. It would take away a platform which sort of legitimizes more criticism of the Jewish people, but they’ll find other ways because anti-Semites don’t need facts.
You have to remember that before ’67, Israel was not an occupier. It came into occupation after a war of defense. Israel grew from 1948 only because it was attacked and fought back.
Now, the hypocrisy of Europe to right the wrong — what wrong? Of occupation. The ‘wrong’ was Israel fought to survive, once, twice, three or four times. So I think that for a short period of time, if Kerry does succeed, we’re going to have a quietus, but at the end of the day, they’ll find something else.
For those of us who are optimists, sometimes something comes out of nothing. What I don’t see is the symmetry in division. We met with Kerry a couple of times recently. He and the president have this vision and I think the majority of the Israeli people have this vision of a peace. I’m not sure there’s a symmetry of that vision in the Arab-Muslim world.
All I hear from them is what they don’t want. I have not heard any expression of this vision of living together, of partnership.
You want a test? Call me the day after Abu Mazen (Mahmoud Abbas) speaks at the United Nations. To me that’s really the next serious test as to whether Mr. Kerry is for real or it’s wishful thinking.
Is Abu Mazen capable of saying “I have a partner. I have a vision.”? If Abu Mazen is able and willing to articulate it publicly, then I think we have a chance.
The environment, the neighborhood, is very unstable, but it is less toxic to peace. What I mean by that: Hamas is weakened. Hezbollah is involved with Syria and Syria certainly is weakened. Egypt is weakened. Iran is engaged now with all kinds of issues. Those elements who would work very hard to undermine any effort of peace are less toxic.
The elements that may embrace it — Saudi Arabia, Jordan, the UAE — in a way have more in common, more in interest, with Israel today than they’ve ever had before. It’s called Iran.
So maybe Kerry is right. Maybe this is the moment.
But I am uncomfortable, by the way, with Kerry’s posturing as to why. The way he paints it, Israel won’t survive, therefore we know better for Israel. I’m not comfortable with that scenario. I think it’s important for the US to be the midwife, it’s critical, essential, but not because you know better for Israel. That’s a mentality that won’t work.
You started with the ADL in 1965, 48 years ago, almost half of the ADL’s historical reign. How would you define your role in ADL during that period?
It’s really for somebody else to define my role. I can only see it from a very personal perspective. I’ve been very privileged, lucky, to do what I do.
For me to spend my waking hours dealing with the elements which almost destroyed me — bigotry, anti-Semitism — and to try to build bridges of understanding and respect — the elements which saved me — is poetic. It’s a movie.
To have been given the privilege of a platform called the Anti-Defamation League which, when I came, was an institution that had credibility and standing and which was a vehicle to fight this . . . if I were independently wealthy this is what I would like to do.
How long do you think you’re going to continue leading this fight?
As long as I have the passion and the physical and mental ability to do it.
Copyright © 2013 by the Intermountain Jewish News
