Rabbi Cohen in the Wall Street Journal!

If you saw the Wall Street Journal last Thursday, you might have seen an ad signed by 400 Rabbis calling on Fox News to sanction Glenn Beck.  I’ve been asked, why would I sign such a letter?  Here’s my response:

Whether or not one agrees with Glenn Beck and his usual writings, his behavior recently invoking the Holocaust and the manner in which he attacks George Soros is inappropriate. George Soros, who was hidden by a Christian family when he was a boy in Nazi Germany, tells of his stories of having to accompany his “father” (the man who hid him) to confiscate Jewish property.  However, Beck describes Soros as a Jewish boy who sent Jews to the death camps.  Glenn Beck has been inappropriate in how he refers to the Holocaust in his report.  We do not need more people who are trying to deny they Holocaust ever happened or seek to lessen the significance of these events as time moves forward.

It has been noted that after being confronted with the evidence of Beck’s constant misuse of Holocaust rhetoric, (in his first 18 months on Fox News, Beck and his guests invoked Hitler 147 times, Nazis 202 times, and the Holocaust 76 times, usually to attack ideological rivals), Roger Ailes and Beck’s producer committed in writing to Jewish leaders and the Jewish community to show “the ultimate sensitivity” when referencing the Holocaust and Nazis. “The Puppet Master,” the three part series by Beck, made a mockery of this commitment.

Here are some articles of interest:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/01/26/AR2011012607540.html

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/special/artsandliving/journalad/index.html