The Jerusalem Post discusses today whether Jews (and, I would presume, others) should urge black leaders and others to disassociate themselves from Louis Farrakhan's second Million Man (sic) March given the racist history of Louis Farrakhan, co-organizer Malik Zulu Shabazz, and the Nation of Islam as an organization.

Among the black leaders who turned out for the Farrakhan news conference were: Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson, District of Columbia Mayor Anthony Williams and Dorothy Height of the National Council of Negro Women. Not present, but reportedly backing the event, were Eleanor Holmes Norton, DC's delegate in Congress and NAACP chairman Julian Bond, as well as Coretta Scott King, widow of Rev. Martin Luther King.

Referring obliquely to the Jewish community, Farrakhan told the gathering: "There are those who... are threatened that we are all here together. And so, one by one, they will come to pick us off."

But the presence of Farrakhan's co-organizer and, some suggest, heir-apparent, Malik Zulu Shabazz, sent an even more sinister message. At a July 2003 news conference, Shabazz declared: "If 3,000 people perished in the World Trade Center attacks and the Jewish population is 10 percent, you show me records of 300 Jewish people dying in the World Trade Center... We're daring anyone to dispute this truth. They got their people out."

In advance of the press club announcement, the ADL's Abe Foxman sent letters to black leaders, imploring: "When will someone in the African-American community stand up and say the Million Man March has a positive message but the pied piper is a racist and anti-Semite?" Merely asking that question strikes rap impresario and black power broker Russell Simmons, who dialogues with liberal rabbis and does big business with Jewish and Israeli Hollywood, as "disrespectful" and likely to "spread anti-Semitism."

I'm sorry, but arguments like those put forward by Simmons are wrong-headed. Would he support a "Faith and Family Rally organized by David Duke? Would it be "disrespectful" and likely to "spread racism" if black leaders spoke out against such an event? Hardly -- and those who urged black leaders to be silent in such a case would be guilty of disrespect and the perpetration of racism for blaming the victim in such a case. So while iI may disagree with Abe Foxman on church-state issues, I applaud him for being on the side of angels in this situation.

The article ends as follows.

It's a tough call. Our challenge is to decide whether Jews' experience with a fruitcake Austrian painter has anything to teach us about the rantings of a black American calypso performer.

My response is to urg Foxman and other Jewish leaders to speak loudly and forcefully -- silence didn't work in Germany, and will do nothing to stop anti-Semitism today.

Posted by: Greg at 01:35 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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