Wiesenthal Appeal for Funds Descends Into Exaggeration and ...

[bemildred]

Divisiveness

Mods, not really I/P but this stuff always seems to go
down here.

My first inkling that America's Jewish community
was being fed a distorted view of European
Jewish life came last May during a BBC-TV
program. Former New York Mayor Ed Koch was
lashing out against increases in anti-Semitism in
Europe. A month later, I heard similar comments
over dinner with one of my mother's best friends.

As a Jew living and traveling in Europe for more
than a decade, I was bewildered. Save for one
nonviolent incident I experienced in Switzerland
years ago, I could fill this page with my own
evidence that Jewish communities are an
accepted piece of the European mosaic.

But then the mystery began to unravel. "A
Growing Threat to European Jews" screamed the
bold script across the length of a large envelope
in the mail. In a quest for money and members,
inside was a plea from Los Angeles' Simon
Wiesenthal Center about the "dramatic rise in
hate rhetoric and hate crimes toward Europe's
Jewish population."

The letter said the highest incidence of
anti-Semitism had occurred in France over a
period going back to October 2000. In that time,
"1,300 anti-Semitic acts have been perpetrated,"
it said, including "verbal and physical attacks,
synagogue fire-bombings and even an assault
on a school bus loaded with Jewish children."

LA Times (Free Reg. Req.)