Helen Thomas has
gone to the crematorium.
Thomas grew up in Detroit, the daughter of Lebanese immigrants.
Middle Eastern affairs were a strong interest and impromptu comments
about Israel and the Palestinians in May 2010 were her undoing.
Asked by an interviewer from the website rabbilive.com
if she had any comments about Israel, Thomas responded, "Get the hell
out of Palestine." She said Jews should "go home, to Poland and Germany,
America and everywhere else."
After the interview spread on the
Internet, her comments were criticized by the White House, the White
House Correspondents' Association, the co-author of one of her books and
the agency that handled her speaking engagements, among others. Shortly
after, she announced her retirement, two months short of her 90th
birthday.
In a February 16 interview on “The Joy Behar Show” on
CNN in 2011, Thomas told Behar that once World War II ended, the Jews
“didn’t have to go anywhere really because they weren’t being persecuted
anymore. But they were taking other people’s land.”
She was
slammed by both sides of the political spectrum. Later that year Thomas,
who was a correspondent since the presidency of John F. Kennedy, stood
by her original comments and accused Jewish lobbyists and politicians of
distorting her remarks.
Thomas later issued a statement: "I
deeply regret my comments I made last week regarding the Israelis and
the Palestinians. They do not reflect my heart-felt belief that peace
will come to the Middle East only when all parties recognize the need
for mutual respect and tolerance. May that day come soon."
However,
follow-up remarks about how “the Zionists” own Congress, the White
House, Hollywood and Wall Street caused further uproar, and prompted the
Society of Professional Journalists to drop an award named for Thomas,
who was a fixture on the White House beat for decades.
Asked on
Behar’s program is she considers herself anti-Semitic, Thomas, whose
parents were Lebanese, said, “Hell no, I’m a Semite.” Of the Jews she
said, “They’re not Semites. Most of them are from Europe.”
Asked
if she regretted making the remark that ended her career in Washington,
she said, “I have regrets that everybody’s misinterpreted it and
distorted it,” singling out former George W. Bush White House spokesman
Ari Fleischer and Anti-Defamation League National Director Abraham
Foxman.
“We have organized lobbyists in favor of Israel, you can’t
open your mouth,” she said. “If you say one thing about Israel, you’re
off limits.”
May the names of the wicked rot away.
Give the lady a break. She was a passionate woman with strong opinions and the Jews did take land from the Palestinians. And sometimes they were unnecessarily brutal in their treatment of them. One lady that now lives in Canada, was in labour with twins but the Israeli soldiers would not let her through a roadblock, to get to the hospital. Both babies died. That was totally unnecessary. She is a Christian and believes you should have the land but if she had been a Muslim you would have just ended up with more terrorists who hate you with all their being. Doing the right thing does not guarantee that all will go well but doing wrong is always going to cost you.
ReplyDeleteI don't agree with the lady but I can see some (only some) of her reasoning. All people need to remember that God owns the land and nobody successfully stands against him.