Forward Editorial: Open America to Iraqi Refugees
The recent discovery that the family of Anne Frank had unsuccessfully attempted to obtain an American visa before being captured by the Nazis shines light on the failure of the United States to do enough to save Jews from the Holocaust. In reaction to the news, Rep. Steve Israel has reintroduced a bill to make the child martyr an honorary American citizen.
“The best way we can honor Anne Frank in death is to give her what her father sought for her in life,” said Israel, a New York Democrat, in a statement last week. “The news that Anne Frank’s family sought to flee to the United States makes it clearer than ever that we should bestow honorary citizenship upon Anne Frank.”
We respectfully disagree: The best way to honor Anne Frank’s memory — and to demonstrate that America has learned a lesson from its past mistakes — would be for the Bush administration to take comprehensive steps to address the needs of the mounting numbers of Iraqi refugees.
The best way to honor Anne Frank is to honor Anne Frank. Meaningless actions like honorary citizenship is demeaning in this instance – as if somehow we can rewrite history – it won’t make AF more alive.
Why are jews so intent on making america a more hostile place for jews by importing another batch of potential anti-semites?
fm–does hating muslims ever get old?
Er, I’m not sure it’s exactly “hating Muslims” to suggest that a number of people presently in Iraq may exactly be desirable candidates to welcome to the US.
Frankly we should be focusing our energy on improving Iraq’s security, annihilating the terrorists, and encouraging or forcing Iraq’s best citizens to stay put in the country so there’ll be a country left for them to invest their efforts and talent in. Helping them evacuate won’t help America or Iraq.
Mobius, all I am saying is it’s a bad idea. On the other hand maybe you’re expecting american jews to make mass aliyah pretty soon in which case it won’t be your problem anymore.
And then ofcouse there is the brain drain issue that Iraq will have to deal with. But that’s their problem.
Formermuslim,
I guess I must have converted into another religion when I thought I was converting into Judaism. You too, apparently? Here I thought that Jews were in favor of extending aid to those who were in dire need due to no acts of their own, but apparently considerations like “does he like me” are superior to those of “do I have a duty to help assure that he isn’t murdered.”
I am somewhat reassured in my original view that Mobius is a Jew. What are you?
The hatred they used to direct on the jews is now directed against themselves. How is that not their own fault?
As my own personal situation illustrates, it’s not hard to detox from Islam. All it takes is a willingness to listen to the other side (in my case read on the internet).
Most muslims are so intoxicated with prejudice toward jews that if you defend jews in public, when the subject comes up, they “accuse” you of being Jewish. They don’t even want to hear the other side. I know, I’ve been in those situations. Here is a real life story. When I was walking with a friend (muslim, doesn’t know I am a formermuslim) from school, and the Mother Of All Issues
came up somewhere in the conversation he said very matter of factly “why are you defending the jews? They are cursed by Allah”.
THAT is what you will have to deal with if you allow more muslims
into the US. Btw, he and I are both turks, the prototype moderate muslims. Do the math.