ADL chief bows to critics; Foxman cites rift, calls Armenian deaths genocide
By Keith O’Brien, Globe Staff
The national director of the Anti-Defamation League bowed to pressure from both the Jewish and Armenian-American communities yesterday and officially acknowledged the genocide of Armenians at the hands of Ottoman Turks more than 90 years ago.
In doing so, Abraham H. Foxman reversed years of ADL policy and a position he had reaffirmed as recently as Friday when he fired the ADL’s New England regional director, Andrew H. Tarsy, for defying the national organization and acknowledging the genocide.
“We have never negated but have always described the painful events of 1915-1918 perpetrated by the Ottoman Empire against Armenians as massacres and atrocities,” Foxman said in a written statement yesterday. But upon reflection, Foxman continued, “the consequences of those actions were indeed tantamount to genocide.”In an interview with the Globe, Foxman said that for some time he has privately believed that the mass killings constituted a genocide, but thought that describing them as atrocities or massacres was enough. Yesterday, he said, he realized this description was dividing the Jewish community and the ADL changed its position.
http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2007/08/22/adl_chief_bows_to_critics/?page=1
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