In defense of American Jewry's behavior during World War II

Rabbi Stephen S. Wise addressing a throng in Battery Park, New York, May 10th,1933 in protest against mistreatment of Jews in Germany.100,000 marched in a parade to the Battery.
 IMAGE: © Bettmann/Corbis

I'm sick and tired of hearing from know-nothing Jewish leaders that my grandparent's generation "did nothing" while Jews were dying in Europe.

The latest insult comes from Aryeh Rubin, of Targum Shlishi, who writes in his newsletter:

I believe that American Jews, their leaders, and their institutions made an insufficient effort to raise the alarm as one-third of world Jewry vanished in the crematoria of Auschwitz.

He adds.

I have increasingly believed most of American Jewry to be guilty of silence and deserving of criticism. That the world let this happen is inconceivable. That American Jewry was generally silent is a travesty.

Aryeh Rubin, I call B.S. You are dead wrong, screamingly ignorant of the facts, and what you have written amounts to a slander of an entire community of Jews.

After the jump. I reveal some of what you apparently don't know, and provide links to newspaper articles that clinch my case.

>>Read more
11,000 American Jewish soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines were killed in World War II, including the Jewish commander of 3rd Armored Division in France, General Marice Rose, who was killed in action.  Were they guilty of silence? What about the tens of thousands of other Jews who served and lived to tell about it? Do they deserve criticism, too?

It is furthermore simply not true to say that American organizations were silent, or to suggest, as many do that all activism in America against the holocaust started with Hillel Kook. A simple review of the archives of the New York Times reveals the truth, including ignored and forgotten facts such as these:

:: In March 1943 Rabbi Stephen Wise, was a presiding officer at a rally at MSG attended by 21,000 people, including the governor, the archbishop of the NY diocese, and senator Robert Wagner. At the rally an 11-point plan was ratified and submitted to the president. Participating organizations included:

• American Jewish Committee
• American Jewish Congress
• American Jewish Labor Comittee
• Agudath Harabonim
• Bnai Brith
• Synagogue Council of America
• World Jewish Congress

These American Jewish organizations rallied, protested, met with leaders, and begged for help. They also sent money and helped refugees resettle, as article after article reveals (see below)

:: In 1942, Wise went on a national tour to (quoting the New York Times of December 28, 1942) "organize and unify efforts for the relief of Jews in Axis dominated lands" The headline: DEMANDS JEWS BE SAVED; Dr. S.S. Wise, at Albany, Calls for Action to Carry Out Protests.

He did this just one month after news of the European slaughter was confirmed by the State Department.

:: Wise was also the first to announce to the papers what was happening in Europe. On November 25,  1942 Wise convened a press conference to announce "that he had learned through sources confirmed by the State Department that about half the estimated 4,000,000 Jews in Nazi-occupied Europe had been slain in an "extermination campaign." ([he next day the Times ran this headline: SLAIN POLISH JEWS PUT AT A MILLION; One-third of Number in Whole Country Said to Have Been Put to Death by Nazis ABATTOIR FOR DEPORTEES Mass Electrocutions, Killing by Injection of Air Bubbles Described in Reports."]

:: The Nov. 25  article quotes Wise as calling for a national day of fasting and mourning, and speaking for a group of organizations, including the Agudath Harabanim, He also calls for Christian organizations to speak out on behalf of the Jewish victims, that is to protest.

I also wish to submit into evidence the following article headlines and summaries. Unfortunately, they are in no particular order, but I hope they make it clear that American Jewry protested, rallied, and did not sit silently on the blood of their brothers.

 DEMANDS JEWS BE SAVED; Dr. S.S. Wise, at Albany, Calls for Action to Carry Out Protests [PDF]
Urges Allied program to halt Nazis slaughter of civilians...View free preview
December 28, 1942 - Article

 SAVE DOOMED JEWS, HUGE RALLY PLEADS; United Nations Must Halt Nazi Murders Now, Leaders Tell 21,000...  [PDF]
Immediate action by the United Nations to save as many as possible of the five million Jews threatened with extermination by Adolf Hitler and to halt the liquidation of European Jews by the Nazis was demanded at a mass demonstration of Christians and Jews...View free preview
March 2, 1943 - Front Page

 HADASSAH PLEDGES ANTI-NAZI SUPPORT; Pittsburgh Session Approves Roosevelt Policies, Demands Palesti...  [PDF]
PITTSBURGH, Oct. 29 -- Support of President Roosevelt and the forces of democracy throughout the world and a plea for resettlement of homeless Jewish masses in Palestine were enthusiastically approved by 1,500 delegates of Hadassah, women's Zionist organi...View free preview
October 30, 1941 - Special to THE NEW YORK TIMES. - Article

 Rescue at Once of Europe's Jews Demanded at Conference Here; IMMEDIATE RESCUE OF JEWS DEMANDED [PDF]
Demands for immediate steps to rescue as many Jews as possible from the Nazi-controlled countries of Europe, and for the establishment of a Jewish Commonwealth in Palestine, were voiced repeatedly yesterday by speakers at the American Jewish Conference at...View free preview
August 31, 1943 - Front Page

 Rescue at Once of Europe's Jews Demanded at Conference Here; IMMEDIATE RESCUE OF JEWS DEMANDED [PDF]
Demands for immediate steps to rescue as many Jews as possible from the Nazi-controlled countries of Europe, and for the establishment of a Jewish Commonwealth in Palestine, were voiced repeatedly yesterday by speakers at the American Jewish Conference at...View free preview
August 31, 1943 - Front Page

 40,000 HERE VIEW MEMORIAL TO JEWS; Madison Square Garden Filled Twice for Mass Tribute to 2,000,000...  [PDF]
Forty thousand persons listened and watched in emotional silence in Madison Square Garden last night to two performances of "We Will Never Die," a dramatic mass memorial to the 2,000,000 Jews killed in Europe. The memorial was staged to stir the Allied na...View free preview
March 10, 1943 - Article

 RALLY OF HOPE' IS HELD; 6,000 Children Take Part in Plea for Aid to Europe's Jews [PDF]
Six thousand children, two-thirds of whom were Jewish, representing the pupils of religious and other schools in the city, participated yesterday in a "Rally of Hope" in Madison Square Garden and united in a prayer and plea for immediate aid for the refug...View free preview
June 7, 1943 - Article

 FIGHT MASS SLAUGHTER; Jewish Groups to Hold Rally in the Garden Tomorrow [PDF]
The mass slaughter of defenseless populations by the Nazis will be condemned at a mass meeting to be held tomorrow evening in Madison Square Garden under the joint auspices of the American Jewish Congress, the Jewish Labor Committee and B'nai Brith....View free preview
July 20, 1942 - Article

 9TH 'NIGHT OF STARS' AIDS JEWISH DRIVE; 1,400 Put On 5-Hour Show at Garden to Help Refugees Resettl...  [PDF]
The ninth annual "Night of Stars," huge variety show for the benefit of the United Jewish Appeal, attracted a capacity crowd of 20,000 to Madison Square Garden last night and raised $100,000 to aid Jewish refugees from Europe and help them resettle in Pal...View free preview
November 25, 1942 - Article

 PRESIDENT RENEWS PLEDGES TO JEWS; He Tells Group Every Effort Will Be Made to Fix Guilt in Axis Cri...  [PDF]
WASHINGTON, Dec. 8 -- President Roosevelt assured a delegation of representatives of Jewish organizations today that the American Government would give full consideration to a proposal made by the delegation for the United States to name a commission whic...View free preview
December 9, 1942 - Special to THE NEW YORK TIMES. - Article

 930,000 WERE AIDED BY JOINT COMMITTEE; Jewish Relief Report Gave Help in Fifty Countries [PDF]
A report on relief and rescue activities, conducted with the support of American Jews in Europe, Palestine and the Western Hemisphere for victims of nazism, was heard yesterday at a meeting in the Hotel Biltmore of the executive committee of the United Je...View free preview

 RABBI MILLER URGES SPEEDY RELIEF STEPS; Says Jews Look to Bermuda -- U.S. Delegates Arrive [PDF]
LONDON, April 16 -- Rabbi Irving Miller, Secretary General of the World Jewish Congress who has arrived in London from New York, said today that the time had come for an earnest and effective effort to save the Jews in Europe from total destruction....View free preview
April 17, 1943 - Wireless to THE NEW YORK TIMES.

 RELIEF GROUP AIDS 795,000 OVERSEAS; Joint Distribution Committee Reports $5,488,000 Outlay for 1942...  [PDF]
The American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee, Inc., appropriated $7,250,000 for relief, emigration aid, educational and reconstructive assistance to 795,000 people abroad during 1942, James H. Becker, chairman of the organization's national council, d...View free preview
December 5, 1942 - Article


 JEWISH CONGRESS ASKS AID IN EUROPE; Chicago Division to Push Succor Programs for the 5,000,000 Jews...  [PDF]
CHICAGO, April 4 -- Jewish leadership of Chicago today turned first to solemn recitation of the Kaddish, or memorial prayer, for 2,000,000 massacred Jews of Europe and then to the shaping of programs designed to save the 5,000,000 living Jews from the Naz...View free preview
April 5, 1943 - Special to THE NEW YORK TIMES. - Article

 Jews in 6 Weeks of Mourning [PDF]
Proclaims mourning period for massacred Eur Jews...View free preview
April 11, 1943 - Article