Wyman Conference on Sept. 21, 2008: “American Voices for Rescue”

“They Spoke Out: American Voices for Rescue from the Holocaust” will be the theme of this year’s Wyman Institute national conference, which will be held at the Fordham University School of Law, 140 West 62 St. (near Ninth Ave.), New York City, on Sunday, September 21, 2008, from 10 am to 4 pm. Click here to register.

The opening session of the conference will launch Rafael Medoff’s powerful new book, Blowing the Whistle on Genocide: Josiah E. DuBois, Jr. and the Struggle for a U.S. Response to the Holocaust, which will be published by Purdue University Press just days before the conference.

This is the first book about an unsung American hero of the Holocaust. DuBois (pronounced Du-BOYS), a young attorney in the Treasury Department, risked his career by blowing the whistle on the State Department’s sabotage of opportunities to rescue Jews from the Nazis. DuBois’s actions helped force a dramatic change in U.S. policy toward Jewish refugees, and he played a key role in the rescue of some 200,000 Jews during the last months of the war. Blowing the Whistle on Genocide is based on previously unpublished interviews with DuBois and his colleagues, as well as rare archival documents. The book’s cover was illustrated by internationally renowned political caricaturist Gerry Gersten.

Click here for more details about the conference

130 Israeli Leaders Urge Yad Vashem to Recognize Bergson Group

JERUSALEM- One hundred and thirty Israeli political and cultural leaders --including former Supreme Court justices, cabinet ministers, and cultural figures-- have signed a petition to Yad Vashem, Israel's central Holocaust institution and museum, urging it to add to its exhibits material about the Holocaust rescue activists known as the Bergson Group.

The petition was organized by The David S. Wyman Institute for Holocaust Studies.

The Bergson Group was a maverick political action committee in the United States in the 1940s that used rallies and newspaper ads to pressure the Roosevelt administration to rescue Jews from Hitler. Its efforts played a key role in facilitating the rescue of more than 200,000 Jews during 1944-1945.

The signatories on the petition included former Supreme Court chief justice Meir Shamgar and fellow-justice Mishael Cheshin; political leaders from the left such as Meretz Party leader Yossi Beilin and former Education Minister Shulamit Aloni, as well as political leaders from the right such former Defense Minister Moshe Arens and former Justice Minister Dan Meridor; leading novelists and playwrights, among them A.B. Yehoshua, David Grossman, and Yehoshua Sobol; and senior historians such as Pulitzer Prize winner Saul Friedlander and Mordecai Paldiel, former head of Yad Vashem 's Department of the Righteous.

(The text of the petition, and the complete list of signatories, follows in the continuation of this article.)

Pres. Bush and Democrats Agree:
U.S. Should Have Bombed Auschwitz

“We should have bombed it.”

With those five words, President George Bush joined a growing list of U.S. leaders from both political parties who have said publicly that the United States should have bombed the Auschwitz death camp or the railroad lines leading to it.

On his visit to Israel’s Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial on January 11,208, the president viewed an enlargement of an aerial reconnaissance photograph of Auschwitz that was taken in the spring of 1944. Mr. Bush then turned to Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice and remarked, “We should have bombed it.”

Similar statements have been made in the past (see below) by President Bill Clinton; Cyrus Vance, when he was Secretary of State in the Carter administration; U.S. Senator and 1972 Democratic presidential nominee George McGovern; and U.S. Senator Claiborne Pell (D-Rhode Island), chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

For many years after World War Two, the popular assumption in the United States was that President Franklin Roosevelt, with his reputation as a humanitarian and champion of the ‘little man’, surely must have done whatever was feasible to save Jews from the Holocaust.

See the full article here


The photo President Bush viewed at Yad Vashem: Auschwitz as seen from U.S. airplanes in 1944.

U.S. Holocaust Museum Agrees to
Recognize Bergson Activists in Exhibit

In response to petitions by Holocaust scholars, Jewish leaders, and families of Holocaust rescue activists, and an appeal by Elie Wiesel, the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum has for the first time publicly pledged to change its Permanent Exhibit to acknowledge the rescue work of the Bergson Group.

The Wyman Institute organized the petitions following statements made at the Institute's June 2007 conference by Prof. Wiesel, Prof. David S. Wyman, and Jewish leader Seymour Reich, urging the Holocaust Museum to add the Bergson Group to its exhibits. (To read more about the conference, click here.)

The Bergson Group, also known as the Emergency Committee to Save the Jewish People of Europe, was a maverick 1940s political action committee that used newspaper ads, rallies, and lobbying on Capitol Hill to publicize the plight of the Jews under Hitler and the need for U.S. rescue action.

In a letter to The David S. Wyman Institute for Holocaust Studies, dated July 30, 2007, Dr. Steven Luckert, chief curator of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, pledged to make changes in the Museum’s Permanent Exhibit “by early spring of 2008” in order to acknowledge “the positive contributions that the Bergson Group made in raising American awareness of the Holocaust and in advocating Jewish rescue.”

The changes will be made in the Museum’s segment concerning the War Refugee Board, a U.S. government agency that was belatedly established by President Franklin Roosevelt, in 1944, as a result of pressure by the Bergson Group, Members of Congress, and Treasury Department officials.

continued...

For the text of the petition by the scholars and Jewish leaders, click here.

For the text of the petition by the families of the rabbis, click here.

Elie Wiesel delivering the keynote address at the Wyman Institute conference.

Catholics, Jews Urge Vatican:
Open Holocaust Archives

WASHINGTON, D.C.- Thirty-five leading Catholic and Jewish scholars and interfaith activists have signed a petition urging the Vatican to open its archives pertaining to the response of Pope Pius XII to the Holocaust.

The petition was organized by internationally-known Jewish leader Seymour Reich and The David S. Wyman Institute for Holocaust Studies.

Although the signatories have a variety of views on the Vatican's response to the Holocaust, they found common ground in the demand to open the archives so the full historical record can be revealed. The signatories include Holocaust scholar Prof. Deborah Lipstadt; Catholic scholar and activist Prof. Leonard Swidler, editor of the Journal of Ecumenical Studies; Rev. Vincent A. Lapomarda, S. J., Holocaust Collection coordinator at Holy Cross College; Prof. Padriac O'Hare, director of the Center for the Study of Jewish-Christian Relations at Merrimack College; and Prof. Michael Berenbaum of the University of Judaism.

For the full text of the petition and the list of signatories, click here.

continued...

450 Cartoonists Urge Poland:
Return Auschwitz Paintings

WASHINGTON, D.C.- Four hundred and fifty cartoonists and comic book creators from around the world have signed a petition urging a Polish museum to return eight portraits to the elderly California artist who painted them in Auschwitz, the Nazi death camp. The petition is the latest development in an ongoing international conflict over the paintings.

Mrs. Dina Babbitt, 83, now of Fenton, CA, was deported to Auschwitz as a teenager in 1943, but her life was spared after the war criminal Dr. Josef Mengele learned of a mural of Snow White that she had painted in the children's barracks. Mengele ordered her to paint portraits of some of the victims of his savage medical experiments. In the 1970s, the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum, a Polish government institution on the site of the former death camp, acquired eight of the paintings, but refuses to give them back to Mrs. Babbitt.

For the full text of the petition and the list of signatories, click here.

See the full article here


Mrs. Dina Babbitt at work recently on a re-creation of the Snow White mural that she painted on the children's barracks at Auschwitz in 1943.

55 Scholars Protest New Book's Claim
That Criticism of FDR on Holocaust is
"Anti-American"

Fifty-five leading Holocaust scholars have denounced a new book which asserts that criticism of President Franklin Roosevelt's response to the Holocaust is "anti-American" and "America-bashing." The book also contains false allegations against reputable historians, severely misrepresents key historical facts, and contains at least twenty-one passages that use language from other books without appropriate attribution.

The book, Saving the Jews: Franklin D. Roosevelt and the Holocaust, by South Carolina divorce attorney Robert N. Rosen, was published by Thunder's Mouth Press earlier this year. Rosen has been invited to address the Roosevelt Presidential Library in Hyde Park, NY, and the Carter Presidential Library, in Atlanta, as well as other institutions.

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Bergson Group Conference
in Tel Aviv

Click here to read about the conference on the Bergson Group that took place recently in Tel Aviv.

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Columbia U. and the Nazis

Click here to watch
the video of the
Wyman Institute's
event on Columbia University
ties to Nazi Germany, sponsored by Targum Shlishi, a Raquel and Aryeh Rubin Foundation.

Or click here to read about the event

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Ten Most Absurd
Statements About
Allies' Response
to the Holocaust

Click here

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Hadassah Honors
Bergson Group

Click here to learn more about the Hadassah-Wyman Institute event in Washington, D.C., honoring a leader of the Bergson Group.

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Nancy Pelosi, the Wyman Institute, and the Bergson Group

Click here to view a recent speech in which Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, discussed the Wyman Institute's research on the involvement of her father, the late U.S. Congressman Thomas D'Alesandro, in the Bergson Group.

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COLUMBIA
AND THE NAZIS

Click here to read about Columbia University's
relations with Nazi Germany.

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A Jewish Refugee
Ship That
Changed History

Click here to view the Wyman Institute's new photo exhibit, "The Voyage of the S.S. Ben Hecht: A Refugee Ship That
Changed History"

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The British Loan Battle That Divided U.S. Jews

Click here to read this feature story in the Jerusalem Post

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Petition for a
Varian Fry Stamp

The Wyman Institute and The Jewish Standard of New Jersey are co-sponsoring a petition to the U.S. Postal Service, asking it to issue a stamp honoring Holocaust rescuer Varian Fry.

Click here to sign the petition

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Wyman Institute Issues Year-End Report on Holocaust Denial

Click here to read the report, Holocaust Denial: A Global Survey - 2007.

(To read the 2006 report, click here.)

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Journal of Ecumenical Studies devotes entire issue to The Abandonment
of the Jews.
Click here to read more.

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Utah Senator Honored for Efforts to Rescue Refugees
read more...

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Reflections on U.S. Jews and the Holocaust

click here to read this important new article in Midstream magazine

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Chagall's Granddaughter Speaks at Wyman Event

To view the Palm Beach Post's coverage of the event, click here.

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The Day the Rabbis Marched
An online exhibit created by the David S. Wyman Institute for Holocaust Studies
click here to view the exhibit

click here to read more

In response to a Wyman Institute petition signed by more than eighty leading journalists and journalism professors, the Newspaper Association of America (NAA) has publicly expressed regret at the failure of U.S. newspaper publishers to aid Jewish refugee journalists fleeing Nazi Germany.  The NAA also pledged to highlight the issue at its national convention and board of directors meeting.

The petition was organized by the Wyman Institute and former New York Times reporter Laurence Zuckerman.  It was based on new research by Prof. Laurel Leff, of Northeastern University, revealing that U.S. journalism schools refused all requests to take in German Jewish journalists fleeing Hitler, and that the American Newspaper Publishers Association (precursor to the Newspaper Association of America) rejected a request by Harvard Prof. Carl Friedrich to discuss the issue for ten minutes at its 1939 convention.  Prof. Leff found evidence that some of the refusals to help were motivated at least in part by antisemitism.  The petition asked the NAA to acknowledge these failures and permit Prof. Leff to address the organization.

continued...

The Bush administration has appointed a special envoy to monitor and combat antisemitism around the world, as required by legislation that passed after the intervention of the Wyman Institute.

The new envoy, Dr. Gregg Rickman, assumes a post required by the terms of Congressman Tom Lantos's Global Antisemitism Review Act of 2004.  To learn more about the bill, the Wyman Institute's role, and the challenges facing Dr. Rickman in his new position, click here.

Josiah E. DuBois, Jr.

A senior U.S. diplomat in Vichy France in 1940 ordered his staff to refrain from giving visas to Jewish refugees or helping British POWs, according to a newly-discovered interview with one of his deputies.

The tape-recorded interview with the deputy, U.S. vice-consul Hiram Bingham IV, was played in public for the first time at a May 24 event on Capitol Hill Capitol Hill honoring Bingham for his work with journalist Varian Fry to rescue Jewish refugees from the Nazis.

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Lamb and Lynx Gaede,
wearing their "Happy Hitler"
T-Shirts

In response to a protest by The David S. Wyman Institute for Holocaust Studies, Teen People magazine, which is owned by Time Inc., has removed from its web site an article that whitewashed a neo-Nazi teenage singing duo.

"It was irresponsible for Teen People to post an article describing these neo-Nazis as 'white separatists' without ever acknowledging that they are racists, admirers of Hitler, and Holocaust-deniers," said Dr. Rafael Medoff, director of the Wyman Institute.  "Time Inc has done the right thing by removing the offensive article from the Teen People web site."

continued...

Hundreds of teenagers in South Florida learned for the first time about efforts to smuggle Jews from Europe to Palestine on the eve of the Holocaust, at two programs organized by the Wyman Institute.

continued... 

Jordan Cancels Anti-Semitic TV Series, After Wyman Institute Organizes Protest

The government of Jordan has canceled an antisemitic television series after receiving a letter of protest from 24 American rabbis who had met recently with Jordan's king.  The protest was organized by The David S. Wyman Institute for Holocaust Studies.

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Editorial - Jewish Ledger (Connecticut) - November 4, 2005

Beating antisemitism too…
It’s easy to get anxious about the renewal of antisemitism both here and abroad. Jewish graves are desecrated in Russia and headstones were overturned in Hartford. The antisemitic “Protocols of the Elders of Zion,” common fare in the Arab world, now pop up at book fairs in Germany, and according to Mark Levin, producer of a film titled “Protocols of the Elders of Zion,” are sold on the streets of Paterson, N.J. and New York City. (continued...)

A large crowd of local residents and dignitaries was on hand as the town of Ridgewood, New Jersey named a street after its most famous native son, Holocaust rescuer Varian Fry, on June 26, 2005.

The featured speaker was William S. Bingham, son of Hiram Bingham IV, the U.S. diplomat who secretly worked with Fry in rescuing more than 2,000 of the world's most famous artists and writers from Vichy France.

continued - click here

Bill Bingham speaking at the
Varian Fry Way ceremony
in Ridgewood, NJ

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