Foxman Knows That Being a Leader Means Defending Human Rights and Israel
Abraham Foxman is one of the best known and one of the most formidable of Jewish communal leaders (“As Some Retire From ADL, Will Abe Be Next?” November 5).
A Holocaust survivor, Abe manifests a visceral understanding of the requirements of Jewish leadership. He never wavers in his commitment to the welfare of the Jewish people. And he understands that this commitment entails both support for human rights and for the welfare of the Jewish state of Israel.
The latter commitment goes back long before Abe became the Anti-Defamation League’s national director. It follows from the realization that the demonization of Israel has as its goal, in almost every case, not the promotion of human rights but the destruction of the Jewish state, which would bring calamity to the Jewish people and remove a human rights model from the Middle East.
At the United Nations, where I work on behalf of human rights, I have come across members of the Secretariat from around the world, including the Arab world, who have expressed appreciation for the ADL’s commitment to human rights, and even for its nuanced statement on the Islamic center planned for near Ground Zero.
Harris O. Schoenberg
President
UN Reform Advocates
New York, N.Y.
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