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Picture of Rafael Medoff

Rafael Medoff

Dr. Medoff is founding director of The David S. Wyman Institute for Holocaust Studies; his most recent book is The Jews Should Keep Quiet: Franklin D. Roosevelt, Rabbi Stephen S. Wise, and the Holocaust.

The Unmentionable Jew, Then and Now

There was a troubling precedent for Dean Doucet’s actions during the Nazi years, when President Franklin D. Roosevelt and his administration repeatedly downplayed or denied the Jewish identity of Hitler’s victims.

Does Palestinian Violence Have Benefits?

There are historical precedents for State Department officials, and other prominent Americans, viewing human rights violations by evil regimes as less important than some policy goal.

Brazil Abandons the Jews—Again

During the Hitler years, the regime of Brazilian president Getulio Vargas, driven by religious antisemitism and hostility to immigration, slammed the country’s doors shut as Jews tried to flee the Nazis.

When Presidents Curse (at the Jews)

Going all the way back to the 1940s, presidents or other senior U.S. officials occasionally have said some ugly things about Israel or Jews.

Insulting Israel is Old News at the State Dept.

U.S. secretaries of state have been leveling unfair accusations against Israel, and sometimes against the Jewish people, for more than 75 years, regardless of whether Israel’s government leaned left or right.

Bernie Sanders Abandons the Jews. Again.

When Soviet Jews needed Bernie Sanders to raise his voice in protest, he abandoned them. Today, when the Israeli victims of Hamas rapes and torture need Senator Sanders to raise his voice on their behalf, he has chosen to abandon them, too.

Australia is DeNazifying, Why Can’t Gaza?

In the years following World War II, many other countries—now including Australia—implemented laws to obstruct neo-Nazi activity, even when such legislation ruffled the feathers of some civil libertarians.

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