On respecting Birthright participants
To the Editor:
Birthright Israel has succeeded by allowing more than 300,000 young Jews to experience Israel’s magic directly, not through the distorting lens of conflict-obsessed reporters. But Birthright’s success also reflects its humanistic, person-centered educational philosophy.
This approach bears repeating to counter the false impression of the JTA article reporting on a debate between Peter Beinart and Barry Shrage, the president of Boston’s Combined Jewish Philanthropies. Describing the popular mifgash meeting program with Israeli soldiers, Shrage added that for Birthrighters, “Their next major decision may be what fraternity they’re going to join; the Israeli’s decision is whether they’re going to live or die in a special unit.” One student, Emily Unger responded, “If that’s the attitude of people running Birthright, that the most important thing I’m thinking about is what fraternity to join, that explains why it wasn’t a program run as if I could think like an intelligent person.”
I understand Unger’s anger. No one wants to be dismissed as a mindless party animal. So let me be clear: We at Birthright respect all our participants and understand the serious dilemmas they face. The program invites 18- to 26-year-olds because we understand that it is the age of great decision-making, requiring clear values -- and time to think.
Birthright Israel’s core educational principles provide a quilted theory -- an integrated platform – combining an experiential approach, a culture of values, a culture of ideas, person-centered education, social interactionism and fun. We respect each participant’s intelligence, independence and integrity, only asking them to participate constructively and then draw their own conclusions.
Barry Shrage knows this. He has been one of the pioneers in the identity-building revolution sweeping the Jewish world. He was humbly acknowledging the life-and-death choices Israelis make – and American students’ good fortune in not having to make that choice.
Gil Troy
Professor, McGill University
Chairman, International Education Committee, Birthright Israel
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Let survivors go to court
To the Editor:
The American Insurance Association ran an ad last week asserting that the “insurance industry seeks to ensure that all unclaimed and unpaid insurance policy from the Holocaust era are appropriately paid.” The AIA ad is not only cynically timed, it is highly misleading.
The insurers’ ad was launched nine days after the House Foreign Affairs Committee unanimously passed the Tom Lantos Justice for Holocaust Survivors’ Act, which restores survivors’ rights to go to court to enforce private contracts and recover our families’ legacies against global insurers such as Generali, Allianz, AXA and others.
The “voluntary” honor system endorsed by AIA, The International Commission on Holocaust Era Insurance Claims, or ICHEIC, paid only 14,000 policies -- not “tens of thousands” as AIA contends. This represents only 2 percent of the 800,000 policies owned by European Jewish before the Holocaust. Accepting ICHEIC’s claim that it paid $500 million including humanitarian payments, this is less than 3 percent of the $20 billion insurers still owe.
While some claimants learned about family policies from a list of names published by ICHEIC, such disclosures already were mandated by several state statutes. ICHEIC actually allowed the companies to publish hundreds of thousands fewer names than would have been required by those state laws.
It is also not true that ICHEIC used “relaxed standards of proof.” ICHEIC allowed Generali to reject claims in which the company said a policy was paid or lapsed but would not provide documentation. It also employed “phantom rules” placing the burden on survivors to produce documents to support claims, which in most cases was impossible for Holocaust survivors. Yet instead of publicly accounting for its actions, ICHEIC disobeyed an act of Congress requiring it to disclose claims data, destroyed batches of records and sealed others for 50 years.
The suggestion that the companies will still process claims “voluntarily” is a familiar charade. In 2007-08, after the House Foreign Affairs Committee passed a similar bill, the insurers promised that the New York State Holocaust Claims Processing Office would “continue to” pay claims under ICHEIC rules. Congress relented. But ICHEIC standards favor the insurers and not surprisingly, between 2008 and now, the New York claims processing office succeeded in helping recover only six policies worth $70,000.
The best way to encourage insurers to “voluntarily” pay their debts is for Congress to restore Holocaust survivors’ legal rights to obtain information within the companies’ control and to hold them accountable in the courts if they refuse to settle fairly. With most survivors in our 80s and 90s, this tragedy for survivors must end now before it is too late.
David Schaecter
President
Holocaust Survivors Foundation USA
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Dismayed by TAPPS stance
To the Editor:
As director of the statewide advocacy group for private schooling in Texas, I was dismayed by the Texas Association of Private and Parochial Schools’ (TAPPS) refusal to accommodate Jewish day school Robert M. Beren Academy’s Sabbath observance by amending the state basketball tournament schedule. Though pleased with TAPPS’ eventual reversal, I was further disappointed with the statement by TAPPS Executive Director Edd Burleson that he did so only in response to legal pressure.
Now Mr. Burleson claims that had TAPPS fought a pending court order postponing the tournament, it would have won. Even worse, he says that TAPPS should not have admitted Beren Academy in the first place.
Texas is home to one of the most ethnically and religiously diverse populations in the country, and we are proud to have hundreds of private schools that serve our citizens with high quality, mission-based educational options. As the largest private school athletic league in the state, TAPPS has the distinct responsibility to manage its affairs with the interests of all its member schools in mind. Inconvenience is no excuse for discrimination.
We continue to hope that the TAPPS board of directors will use this opportunity to align its policies with the desire of many of its member schools to provide a fair competitive environment for Texas students.
Charles T. Evans
Executive Director
Texas Association of Non-Public Schools
Austin, Texas
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Gefilte Fish Pond?
To the Editor:
I am Jewish and retired military. I suggest the name Jew Pond be retained and the pond stocked with catfish and carp or another whitefish, so it can become a source of Jewish sushi -- gefilte fish. The town could then boast as having the source of a well-established culinary delight.
Paul Lilling
Maitland, Fla.
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Ban metzizah b’peh ritual
To the Editor:
It's time to condemn metzizah b'peh, the barbaric direct oral suction of an infant's genitals, in the strongest terms and demand that it be outlawed. Then the Orthodox can say they have an excuse to stop doing it.
Ron Low
Chicago, Ill.
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Uninformed Santorum
To the Editor:
As a former senator, I would think Rick Santorum would have more knowledge about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. And as someone who prides himself on being such a devout Christian, I would think he would know all of the passages in the Bible that refer to peace and abolishing war. I am not even a Christian but I know about the quotations of Jesus Christ in the New Testament.
So the only thing I can say is Rick Santorum, go back and read your Bible a little bit better. When the Republicans nominate someone, it is going to have to be someone a little better informed.
Tim Upham
Tumtum, Wash.
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Plaudits for YU coach beyond record
To the Editor:
I must register my disappointment with your blurb concerning the article on Yeshiva University's basketball coach, Jonathan Halpert ("Bad News Maccabees"), in the Daily Briefing of Feb. 21. In fact, he is one of the "winningest" coaches in college basketball, a fact that is born out in the article, which stresses his special values and perspective. This is not to make an excuse for his having many teams that didn't register a winning record, but rather that the yardstick for success transcends "W's" and "L's."
The JTA of all news organizations should be better attuned to the role played in life by "middot," personal qualities. The negative and cutesy copy that couched the article's link did a disservice to one of the most outstanding coaches -- and people -- who I and thousands of others admire.
David Kufeld
New York, N.Y.
The writer played for Halpert at Yeshiva University in the late 1970s.
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On violating religious tenets
To the Editor:
Regarding the recent controversy over the contraception mandate, the Jewish organizations are missing the fundamental issue. This has nothing to do with the contraceptives and everything to do with the ability of the federal government to mandate activities that violate religious tenets.
Suppose the government issued a rule that the work week now consists of six days, seven hours, with Sunday as the non-work day. Employees would be required to appear all other days. Clearly the Jewish community would suddenly have an issue.
It is the principle that the government cannot make laws respecting (or disrespecting) religion or its free exercise that we must support. We have a clear need to weigh in on the side of those opposing this intrusion regardless of our feelings about the actual policy (I happen to believe that contraception and abortion are personal choices).
The way to do this is to get the government out of the health insurance business by removing the employer tax benefit and having everyone buy their own policy without state's restrictions (i.e., across state lines). If a subsidy is needed, you get a voucher or some similar system.
Steven Cohen
Phoenix, Ariz.
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New Jewish parliament not legitimate
To the Editor:
Re the new European Jewish Parliament: I have no idea who these so-called parliamentarians are. Their website lists two supposed representatives from Austria, but I have no idea who selected them. They certainly don't represent the Austrian Jewish Communities, and none of the Salzburg Jews seem to have been asked who we want to represent us.
The organization has no legitimacy, and U.S. Jewish organizations shouldn't be suckered into giving them any.
Stan Nadel
Salzburg, Austria
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Holocaust archive lacking sources
To the Editor:
Two million entries online is commendable, however the apparent complete lack of source listings for the archive material is to be lamented. A document without a source is rendered trivial, and the Holocaust hardly seems to be a topic to be treated with such disregard for standard minimums of historical methodology.
If there is some technical difficulty with adding a category for the source -- having a fair idea about the construction of databases, I find hard it to imagine -- then HEART at bare minimum could post a page with a general listing of their source material.
Perhaps the goal of HEART is not so much to "never forget" the Holocaust in the historical sense as to "never forget" that there are still assets to be restituted, and that they intend to be the central mediators in that process. No other Holocaust-related site that I am aware of so completely fails to qualify its source material.
Hopefully this shortcoming will be remedied at some point in the near future, but until that point the HEART archive is helpful for restitution heirs and attorneys but practically useless for historical research. No source means no verification of authenticity.
Roderick Miller
Berlin, Germany
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