Will All Jewish People Be Forced to Become Clones of Alan Dershowitz and Alan Solomont?

The following letter raises the question whether all Jewish people are being pressured to become clones of racists like Alan Dershowitz and Alan Solomont.
Dear Mr. Pawlick:
      I have a possible case of libel and wanted your opinion of it. There is a local newspaper in my area (North Andover) called "The Valley Patriot". It is similar to your Mass News in format and is "conservative" in a more populist way. The first time I read an issue of "The Valley Patriot" I couldn't believe the anti-Arab bias of it. I'm no bleeding heart civil rights person but I felt the need to explain to the readers why we are in Iraq, and the cause of the Arab hatred that leads to terrorism such as  9/11.
     I wrote a letter showing that this war was not about oil, it was to make the middle east safe for Israel. I knew they would not be allowed to print anything else from me after that, which is fine, but the editor referred to me in the latest issue as "an anti-Semite who blames all of the evils of the world on the Jews".
     I knew this guy was nuts just from some of the email we exchanged, but this totally crosses the line of a responsible editor.
     I expected the "anti-Semite" label, which would be bad enough, but the "blames the evils of the world on Jews" is beyond libel. There is no more damaging slander than this to make you a social pariah. In fact many people lose their jobs and careers for this.
     I was thinking about the ACLU, but using a left wing group to sue a local "conservative" newspaper would probably get me run out of town.
     I have gotten your newspaper before and enjoy it and am actually a "conservative" myself but not a blind-faith "neo-conservative" like the people who have hijacked the Republican party.    
      J ust wondered what your thoughts as a lawyer would be.                           Thanks,  
              Andy Beresford

Publisher’s Comment: I have not seen any of your other letters to the Valley Patriot but I assume they are as temperate as this one.
     Tom Duggan is a longtime conservative activist in Lawrence, but because he started so young, he is still a young man. He wrote some stories for us as a freelancer back in 2000 and then was hired by the Executive Director of Mass. Citizens for Marriage, Bryan Rudnick, as an assistant. But they apparently had personality conflicts.
     Tom has an independent spirit, as do I, and has been publishing news about Lawrence for a long time. We undoubtedly agree on most issues. It is understandable for him to argue that the presence of Israel is a benefit to America, but it is not fair to brand you or anyone as anti-Semitic because you disagree.
     After all, even the Boston Globe agreed with you for the first few chaotic days after 9/11. During that period, the Globe printed at least four stories, saying that close ties to Israel were largely responsible for the hatred of the Muslims.
     Then orders started flowing to Boston from Alan O. Sulzberger Jr., Chairman of the Times, in New York.

Globe Wrote that Friendship with Israel Caused Our Problems
     In a major story on 9/12, the lead paragraph (by a Globe staffer) said: Palestinian youths danced and handed out candies on the streets here and in Jerusalem yesterday to celebrate the terrorist strikes against the United States, and even those Palestinians who mourned the loss of civilian life said the US government got what it deserved. ... I feel sympathy with the civilian victims, but we support the message that is sent to the government of America. ... The suicide bombings in Israel are just a little reaction to the Israeli aggression against the Palestinian people. Violence breeds violence. In the end . . . America and Israel will perish.”
     The next day, another major story had this in its lead: “ Arab anger at America has surged during the past year of Israeli-Palestinian fighting, but the hatred that may have spawned the worst-ever terror attack on the United States has roots that date back a decade or more to the 1991 Gulf War, policy makers and specialists said yesterday.”
     After all, the Jewish people themselves have been deeply divided over the issue of Zionism and the creation of Israel in 1947. The issue of Zionism began in earnest in the U.S. about 1890 and was spearheaded by Louis Brandeis, who later became a Supreme Court judge. The founder of the modern New York Times, Adolph Ochs, himself a Jew. called Brandeis a “professional Jew” and opposed his appointment to the Supreme Court by Woodrow Wilson in 1916. The Times continued to oppose the concept of Zionism and Israel even after its founding in 1947 until the pressure on it became too great.
     In 1978, the well known rabbi at Dartmouth College and former President of the American Jewish Congress, Prof. Arthur Hertzburg wrote in this statement that Zionism had failed.
     “Classic Zionism asserted that it understood and could tame anti-Semitism; that it could either sustain or make an end of the Diaspora; and that at the very least, in Israel a normal nation among the nations. As a matter of fact, all of these propositions have been disproved by history. ... it is impolitic to say such things out loud ...”
     While most rabbis totally support Zionism and Israel without question, there are many others, such as Prof. Hertzburg, who have their own thoughts. They are mostly Orthodox who have a strong belief in God. Two of Hertzburg’s recent statements are linked here. Many conservatives believe that while the Professor’s statements may be good theory, it has been shown that “separation of church and statement” (which cannot be found anywhere in the Constitution and was coined by Deist Thomas Jefferson) is impossible. They say that America has shown in recent years that we cannot have a vacuum in our religious belief. They say we now have a religious “force” in place which does not believe in “God” but is a religion of its own. It is a force of atheists, such as the humanists of the Unitarian Church. The Supreme Court also indicated recently that it is true that atheism can be a “religion” of its own.

Sharon and Bush `Will Fry in Hell' - Executive Intelligence Review

Testimony of Rabbi Arthur Hertzberg, Founding Board Member of The Interfaith Alliance - Interfaith Reliance