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Abraham Foxman, ADL's national director:"Because of our concern for the unity of the Jewish community at a time of increased threats against the the Jewish people, ADL has decided to revisit the tragedy that befell the Armenians.”
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NEW YORK (EJP)---The Anti-Defamation League has called a World War I-era massacre of Armenians a genocide, a change that comes days after the organisation fired a regional director for taking the same stance.
In a statement issued on Tuesday, the New-York based ADL’s director Abraham Foxman said that the killings of Armenians by the Turks "were indeed tantamount to genocide."
The statement came after weeks of controversy in which critics questioned whether an organization dedicated to fighting anti-Ssemitism in the world and remembering Holocaust victims could remain credible without acknowledging the Armenian killings as genocide.
Foxman said: “In light of the heated controversy that has surrounded the Turkish-Armenian issue in recent weeks, and because of our concern for the unity of the Jewish community at a time of increased threats against the Jewish people, ADL has decided to revisit the tragedy that befell the Armenians.”
He added:” We have never negated but have always described the painful events of 1915-1918 perpetrated by the Ottoman Empire against the Armenians as massacres and atrocities. On reflection, we have come to share the view of Henry Morgenthau, Sr. that the consequences of those actions were indeed tantamount to genocide. If the word genocide had existed then, they would have called it genocide.”
The ADL director said he consulted with his friend Nobel Laureate Elie Wiesel and other respected historians “who acknowledge this consensus.”
He expressed the hope “that Turkey will understand that it is Turkey’s friends who urge that nation to confront its past and work to reconcile with Armenians over this dark chapter in history.”
Congress resolution
However, Foxman stopped short of saying that the ADL would support a resolution pending in the US Congress to formally acknowledge the Armenian genocide.
“We continue to firmly believe that a Congressional resolution on such matters is a counterproductive diversion and will not foster reconciliation between Turks and Armenians and may put at risk the Turkish Jewish community and the important multilateral relationship between Turkey, Israel and the United States,” he said.
Both Jewish and Armenian-American leaders applauded Foxman for his policy shift.
Aram Hamparian, executive director of the Armenian National Committee of America, said he believed that the ADL’s policy change and the attention the debate has attracted would boost the profile of the resolution in Congress this fall.
"I think it only helps the legislation," Hamparian said. "I think it shows that even long-standing reservations about the genocide itself are crumbling in the face of community pressure and facts. The opposition is falling apart."
