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July 2, 2009

Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski: The hallmark of a person

Abe Novick: Up, up, and aliya

July 1, 2009

Rabbi Avi Shafran: The Road Taken

The Kosher Gourmet by Marialisa Calta: Get into the holiday spirit with these Star-Spangled desserts

June 30, 2009

Rabbi Binyomin Ginsberg: What makes a great parent?

Caroline B. Glick: Ideologue-in-Chief

June 29, 2009

The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Beware of 'Caveat Emptor'

Steven Emerson: ACLU pushing for more money for Hamas

June 26, 2009

Rabbi Yoni Posnick: Learn the secret to a healthy marriage from a scriptural villain

Caroline B. Glick: Barack Obama vs. International Law

June 25, 2009

Rabbi Shimon Apisdorf: The Absurd Power of Truth

Jordan "Gorf" Gorfinkle's strip: Everything's Relative

June 24, 2009

Rabbi Yonason Goldson: Advancement of technology is a wake-up call for humanity

The Kosher Gourmet by Andrea Weigl: Summer on a stick: Making frozen treats can be easy, creative and fun

June 23, 2009

Martin M. Bodek: 'On Surnames': And so, We Begin

Caroline B. Glick: The Obama Effect

June 22, 2009

The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Working for a corrupt firm

N. Richard Greenfield : Where are American Jews?

June 19, 2009

Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski: Emotion v. intellect

Caroline B. Glick: Israel's rare opportunity

June 18, 2009

Jonathan Rosenblum: Sometimes it is more essential to define the nature of evil than good

Jordan "Gorf" Gorfinkle's strip: Everything's Relative

June 17, 2009

Rabbi Yonason Goldson: The Language of Confusion

The Kosher Gourmet by Linda Gassenheimer: Nothing pleases Dad more than a thick, juicy onion-smothered steak. Add home-Baked Potato Chips and …

June 16, 2009

The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Career v. Careersism

Caroline B. Glick: Obama's losing streak and Israel

Richard Z. Chesnoff: ‘Palestinians’: Never Missing an Opportunity …

June 15, 2009

Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu: How Judea and Samaria can become 'Palestine'

Daniel Pipes: Where Netanyahu's speech failed

June 12, 2009

Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski: Some big thoughts about not acting so big

Caroline B. Glick: Obama's High Commissioner

June 11, 2009

Victor Davis Hanson: Our historically challenged President

Mitch Albom: Beware the True Believers

Lewis Grossberger: What we learn from the new Hitler photos

June 10, 2009

Mort Zuckerman: What Obama and his advisors won't -- or refuse to -- grasp about Israel and the Muslim world

The Kosher Gourmet by Steve Petusevsky Lotsa pasta: Tips, techniques and (amazing) taste

June 9, 2009

Anne Bayefsky: Obama's stunning offense to Israel and the Jewish people

Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.: America's first Muslim president?

June 8, 2009

The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Merchant must take responsibility for careless shopper?

Mark Steyn: A superpower that feeds on mediocrity cannot survive for long on leftovers from the past

Richard Z. Chesnoff: How do you say 'kumbaya' in Arabic?

June 5, 2009

Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski: In quest of spirituality

Caroline B. Glick: Obama's Arabian dreams

Charles Krauthammer: The Settlements Myth

June 4, 2009

Paul Greenberg: The War Comes to Little Rock

The Kosher Gourmet by Judy Hevrdejs: Splash it on! Tap your inner jazz musician and improvise when stirring up a vinaigrette

June 3, 2009

The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Q. Should terrible teacher be exposed?

Jonathan Rosenblum: The Israel Lobby: Missing in Action

June 2, 2009

Dennis Prager: The Speech President Obama Won't Dare Give in Egypt

Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.: Pressure on Israel raises war risk

Oct. 29, 2003
Mortimer B. Zuckerman: Graffiti On History's Walls (MUST-READ!)

Jewish World Review July 5, 2007 / 19 Tamuz, 5767

Op-Ed Freebees for Hamas: Can Osama Be Far Behind?

By Marvin Hier and Abraham Cooper


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http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | It is not every day when one of the leaders of a terrorist organization can boast that his op-ed piece was printed simultaneously by the New York Times and the Washington Post. But that's exactly what happened on June 20, 2007, when Ahmed Yousef, a senior leader of Hamas, penned an essay defending his group's unilateral, bloody coup in Gaza.


In reaction to a firestorm of protest, The NYTimes' Public Editor, Clark Hoyt, defended his newspaper's position stating, "The point of the Op-Ed page is advocacy and reminding readers op-ed pages are for debate and if you get only one side, that's not debate." He quoted NYTimes editors as saying "that the takeover of Gaza was one of the most important stories of the week it was our opportunity to hear what Hamas had to say."


In 2007, it is difficult fathom the free pass provided to Hamas by the NYTimes and Washington Post. Does their logic mean that had Osama Bin Laden, who took responsibility for the murder of almost 3,000 people at the World Trade Center, would have penned an op-ed piece a week after 9/11 that either the would have published it?


Let's be clear: The issue has never been about giving ink to Hamas' views. Their statements and actions deserve real-time coverage by the media, just the way the statements and actions of a Hitler and Stalin deserved massive scrutiny and ongoing coverage by the newspapers of record in the world's most important democracy.


But back then, from the 1930s to 1950s the NYTimes failed miserably in its responsibilities to expose in real-time, the genocidal horrors of the Nazi Holocaust and Stalin's murderous purges and deportations of millions throughout his decades of iron rule in the USSR. Holocaust scholar Michael Berenbaum put it this way, "as the death toll grows, the headlines shrink." The July 2, 1942 headline "700,000 Victims," was posted Page Six detailing the murder over a half million Jews, including in mobile gas ovens. Page One was reserved for New York Governor Herbert Lehman's donation of his tennis shoes to the war effort. When on December 18, 1942, the NYT finally front-paged, a story on Hitler's Final Solution, entitled, "11 Allies Condemn Nazi War on Jews", The Washington Post printed the same story on Page Four, while The Los Angeles Times placed it on Page Ten.


As for the Soviet Union, Walter Durant, the New York Times longtime Moscow Bureau Chief, won a Pulitzer Prize for stories that effectively buried Ukraine's invisible victims under an avalanche of praise for Stalin's deadly policies.


And let us not forget that, like Hamas, Hitler also sought election through the democratic process. But once he took power he made it clear, just like Hamas, that his god was the bullet, not the ballot.


Do we really have to remind the gatekeepers of the media that there is a world of difference between quoting someone in a news story, be it Hitler or Bin Laden, and giving conferring the legitimacy of a byline in the nation's most respected newspapers. If the criteria is simply because it is an important story, then should have we expected bylines from the likes of Auschwitz's Dr. Joseph Mengele, or the Virginia Tech mass murderer posthumous last will and testament?


Yes, Newspapers have the right and responsibility to inform their readers about by dictators and despots. But they don't have the right to bestow credibility upon those dedicated to genocide.


Sadly today, the moral price we all pay when op-ed freebees are provided for terrorists seems lost even on those empowered to correct mistakes.


In his defense of the Hamas piece, Clark Hoyt, the New York Times' Public Editor admitted that a recent op-ed on Veganism, "hit much closer to home" than Hamas' record of targeted mass murder and maiming against thousands of unsuspecting, innocent civilians men, women and children - on busses, in shopping malls and in restaurants.Neither that record nor their current policy of tossing Arab opponents off of rooftops seems to make a dent in the editorial room.


Can Bin Laden be far behind?

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Rabbi Marvin Hier is the Dean and Founder of the Simon Wiesenthal Center. Rabbi Abraham Cooper is its Associate Dean.

© 2007, Simon Wiesenthal Center