Today’s Zaman, Turkey
Aug 19 2007
US Jewish group fires official over `genocide’ stance
A respected US Jewish group has fired its New England regional
director after he publicly supported Armenian claims of genocide at
the hands of the Ottoman Empire and demanded that the organization
endorse the charges, according to a report in the US media.
The Anti-Defamation League (ADL), primarily known for fighting
anti-Semitism, fired Andrew Tarsy on Friday, the Boston Globe
reported. Tarsy told the newspaper that the organization’s stance is
"morally indefensible." The paper further reported that Tarsy’s
firing prompted a backlash among local Jewish leaders against the
ADL’s leadership.
"I’m devastated to hear the news," Ronne Friedman, senior rabbi at
Temple Israel, the largest synagogue in Boston, was quoted as saying
by the paper. "I think it’s an inexcusable behavior on the part of
the national office."
Tarsy said he had been in conflict with ADL leadership for several
weeks, although he added: "I regret at this point any
characterization of the genocide that I made publicly other than to
call it a genocide." Steve Grossman, a businessman and a former ADL
regional board member, said he predicted the firing of Tarsy "will
precipitate wholesale resignations from the regional board, a
meaningful reduction in the ADL’s regional fund-raising and will
further exacerbate the ADL’s relationship with the non-Jewish
community coming out of this crisis around the Armenian genocide."
In a response letter published in various community newspapers across
the New England region, the ADL said it has never denied "the
massacres of hundreds of thousands of Armenians — and by some
accounts more than 1 million — at the hands of the Ottoman Empire in
1915-1918" and that the "the Turkish government must do more than it
has to confront its history and to seek reconciliation with the
Armenian people."
But it added that legislative efforts outside of Turkey are
"counterproductive to the goal of having Turkey itself come to grips
with its past," explaining that it takes no position on a resolution
in the US House of Representatives that calls on the US
administration to recognize the alleged genocide.
It also said it cannot ignore concerns of the Jewish community in
Turkey, which "has clearly expressed to us its concerns about the
impact of congressional action on them, and we cannot ignore those
concerns." It also noted its desire to protect the interests of
Israel, which considers Turkey a strategic ally in a hostile region.
Turkey categorically rejects characterization of the World War I
events as genocide, saying both that the death toll is inflated and
that as many Turks were killed when Armenians took up arms against
the Ottoman Empire and the civilian population of eastern Anatolia in
collaboration with the invading Russian army, hoping to create an
Armenian state in part of eastern Anatolia.
20.08.2007
Today’s Zaman Ýstanbul