A.D.L. Failure
December 12, 1995 - Jacob Seidenberg
Mr. Abraham Foxman
National Director
Anti-Defamation League of B'nai Brith
Thank you for sending me the ADL piece on John Loftus's book, The Secret War Against The Jews. I take it that the application of the ADL comment to the Pollard case is that you consider that the book's flaws in the areas you have discussed vitiate its findings concerning Pollard.
I hope you will bring the same reservations against the CIA and the FBI, which have made charges in opposing Pollard's release and have themselves been accused of being untrustworthy. If you heard Senator Simpson on television yesterday, you heard him speak of the popular distrust of government and the media, a skepticism frequently noted.
In a recent letter you explained that ADL has consistently voted not to get involved because Pollard's case is not tainted with anti-Semitism. Certainly nothing in Judaism prohibits a Jew from helping a Jew in trouble in the absence of anti-Semitism, nor is there anything to such effect in ADL's statement of purpose. Quite the contrary; ADL does not even limit its efforts to Jews.
Anti-semitism aside, if the treatment of Jonathan Pollard
(and
of his former wife, Anne,and
of Aviem Sella, his brief handler and the leader of the bombing of the the Iraqi nuclear plant) does not register on the antennas of the ADL, the ADL has lost Jewish sensitivity.Prime Ministers Shamir, Rabin, and now (just yesterday) Peres have appealed to the President to release Pollard. Eighty members of the Knesset, from left and right, signed a bill to grant him Israeli citizenship "as a token of appreciation for his efforts on behalf of the state of Israel." Israel recently granted him citizenship. If that is not enough for ADL to bring its full influence to bear on behalf of Pollard, one must wonder how ADL selects its undertakings and where its interests lie.
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