At the invitation of the House International Relations Committee, the David S. Wyman Institute for Holocaust Studies recently held a briefing session for Congress-members and staffers on the U.S. failure to bomb the Auschwitz death camp.
The Wyman Institute event was held on Capitol Hill on January 25, in conjunction with other international events commemorating the 60th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz, including a United Nations session on January 24 and a gathering of world leaders at the Auschwitz site on January 27.
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May 16, 2008
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Pres. Bush and Democrats Agree: “We should have bombed it.” With those five words, President George Bush joined a growing list of U.S. leaders from both political parties who have said publicly that the United States should have bombed the Auschwitz death camp or the railroad lines leading to it. On his visit to Israel’s Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial on January 11,208, the president viewed an enlargement of an aerial reconnaissance photograph of Auschwitz that was taken in the spring of 1944. Mr. Bush then turned to Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice and remarked, “We should have bombed it.” Similar statements have been made in the past (see below) by President Bill Clinton; Cyrus Vance, when he was Secretary of State in the Carter administration; U.S. Senator and 1972 Democratic presidential nominee George McGovern; and U.S. Senator Claiborne Pell (D-Rhode Island), chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. For many years after World War Two, the popular assumption in the United States was that President Franklin Roosevelt, with his reputation as a humanitarian and champion of the ‘little man’, surely must have done whatever was feasible to save Jews from the Holocaust. See the full article here U.S. Holocaust Museum Agrees to In response to petitions by Holocaust scholars, Jewish leaders, and families of Holocaust rescue activists, and an appeal by Elie Wiesel, the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum has for the first time publicly pledged to change its Permanent Exhibit to acknowledge the rescue work of the Bergson Group. The Wyman Institute organized the petitions following statements made at the Institute's June 2007 conference by Prof. Wiesel, Prof. David S. Wyman, and Jewish leader Seymour Reich, urging the Holocaust Museum to add the Bergson Group to its exhibits. (To read more about the conference, click here.) The Bergson Group, also known as the Emergency Committee to Save the Jewish People of Europe, was a maverick 1940s political action committee that used newspaper ads, rallies, and lobbying on Capitol Hill to publicize the plight of the Jews under Hitler and the need for U.S. rescue action. In a letter to The David S. Wyman Institute for Holocaust Studies, dated July 30, 2007, Dr. Steven Luckert, chief curator of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, pledged to make changes in the Museum’s Permanent Exhibit “by early spring of 2008” in order to acknowledge “the positive contributions that the Bergson Group made in raising American awareness of the Holocaust and in advocating Jewish rescue.” The changes will be made in the Museum’s segment concerning the War Refugee Board, a U.S. government agency that was belatedly established by President Franklin Roosevelt, in 1944, as a result of pressure by the Bergson Group, Members of Congress, and Treasury Department officials. For the text of the petition by the scholars and Jewish leaders, click here. For the text of the petition by the families of the rabbis, click here.
Catholics, Jews Urge Vatican: WASHINGTON, D.C.- Thirty-five leading Catholic and Jewish scholars and interfaith activists have signed a petition urging the Vatican to open its archives pertaining to the response of Pope Pius XII to the Holocaust. The petition was organized by internationally-known Jewish leader Seymour Reich and The David S. Wyman Institute for Holocaust Studies. Although the signatories have a variety of views on the Vatican's response to the Holocaust, they found common ground in the demand to open the archives so the full historical record can be revealed. The signatories include Holocaust scholar Prof. Deborah Lipstadt; Catholic scholar and activist Prof. Leonard Swidler, editor of the Journal of Ecumenical Studies; Rev. Vincent A. Lapomarda, S. J., Holocaust Collection coordinator at Holy Cross College; Prof. Padriac O'Hare, director of the Center for the Study of Jewish-Christian Relations at Merrimack College; and Prof. Michael Berenbaum of the University of Judaism. For the full text of the petition and the list of signatories, click here. 450 Cartoonists Urge Poland: WASHINGTON, D.C.- Four hundred and fifty cartoonists and comic book creators from around the world have signed a petition urging a Polish museum to return eight portraits to the elderly California artist who painted them in Auschwitz, the Nazi death camp. The petition is the latest development in an ongoing international conflict over the paintings.
For the full text of the petition and the list of signatories, click here. See the full article here 55 Scholars Protest New Book's Claim Fifty-five leading Holocaust scholars have denounced a new book which asserts that criticism of President Franklin Roosevelt's response to the Holocaust is "anti-American" and "America-bashing." The book also contains false allegations against reputable historians, severely misrepresents key historical facts, and contains at least twenty-one passages that use language from other books without appropriate attribution. |
COLUMBIA AND THE NAZIS Click here to read about the recent Wyman Institute event Ten Most Absurd Hadassah Honors Click here to learn more about the Hadassah-Wyman Institute event in Washington, D.C., honoring a leader of the Bergson Group. Nancy Pelosi, the Wyman Institute, and the Bergson Group Click here to view a recent speech in which Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, discussed the Wyman Institute's research on the involvement of her father, the late U.S. Congressman Thomas D'Alesandro, in the Bergson Group. COLUMBIA Click here to read about Columbia University's A Jewish Refugee Click here to view the Wyman Institute's new photo exhibit, "The Voyage of the S.S. Ben Hecht: A Refugee Ship That  The British Loan Battle That Divided U.S. Jews Click here to read this feature story in the Jerusalem Post  Petition for a The Wyman Institute and The Jewish Standard of New Jersey are co-sponsoring
a petition to the U.S. Postal Service, asking it to issue a stamp honoring Holocaust rescuer Varian Fry. Wyman Institute Issues Year-End Report on Holocaust Denial Journal of
Ecumenical Studies
devotes entire issue to The Abandonment Utah Senator Honored for Efforts to Rescue Refugees read more... Reflections on U.S. Jews and the Holocaust Chagall's Granddaughter Speaks at Wyman Event
The Day the Rabbis Marched History Channel Distorted FDR's Response to the Holocaust read more... Chicago Names Street After Ben Hecht read more... Stephen Wise Was "Cautious and Ineffective" During the Holocaust, Say Scholars read more... White House Official Praises Wyman Institute read more... Scholar Reveals Harvard's Ties to Nazis read more... With "Substantial Boost" from Wyman Institute, Antisemitism Bill Becomes Law read more... The Pageant That Alerted America About the Holocaust
Click here for links to other Holocaust-related websites |
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Newspaper Association Acknowledges Failure to Aid Jewish Journalists Fleeing Hitler In response to a Wyman Institute petition signed by more than eighty leading journalists and journalism professors, the Newspaper Association of America (NAA) has publicly expressed regret at the failure of U.S. newspaper publishers to aid Jewish refugee journalists fleeing Nazi Germany. The NAA also pledged to highlight the issue at its national convention and board of directors meeting. | |||||
Wyman Institute Played Key Role U.S. Names Envoy to Combat Antisemitism | |||||
The Bush administration has appointed a special envoy to monitor and combat antisemitism around the world, as required by legislation that passed after the intervention of the Wyman Institute. |  Congressman Tom Lantos | ||||
Holocaust Whistle-Blower Honored at Wyman Institute Conference |
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It was standing room-only at the University of Pennsylvania Law School on June 11, at the Wyman Institute's fourth national conference, "Blowing the Whistle on Genocide: Josiah E. DuBois, Jr. and the Struggle for an American Response to the Holocaust." Penn Law School alumnus Josiah E. DuBois, Jr. (1913-1983) was the focus of the conference. DuBois was a Treasury Department official who played the central role in exposing the State Department's obstruction of rescue from the Holocaust. |
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| "Don't Help Jews or British POWs," U.S. Diplomat Ordered Staff in 1940 |
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A senior U.S. diplomat in Vichy France in 1940 ordered his staff to refrain from giving visas to Jewish refugees or helping British POWs, according to a newly-discovered interview with one of his deputies. |
 Hiram Bingham IV |
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After Wyman Institute Protests, Time Inc. Drops Article Whitewashing Neo-Nazis |
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In response to a protest by The David S. Wyman Institute for Holocaust Studies, Teen People magazine, which is owned by Time Inc., has removed from its web site an article that whitewashed a neo-Nazi teenage singing duo. |
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Daughter of Holocaust Rescuer Speaks to Hundreds of Students |
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Hundreds of teenagers in South Florida learned for the first time about efforts to smuggle Jews from Europe to Palestine on the eve of the Holocaust, at two programs organized by the Wyman Institute. |
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Jordan Cancels Anti-Semitic TV Series, After Wyman Institute Organizes Protest |
Editorial - Jewish Ledger (Connecticut) - November 4, 2005 |
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Wyman Institute's Third National Conference Called "a Huge Success from Start to Finish" An array of outstanding scholars, political figures, and cultural luminaries headlined the third national conference of the Wyman Institute, "America and the Holocaust: Politics, Art, History," held September 18 at the Fordham University School of Law in New York City. continued - click here |
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New Jersey Town Names Street after Holocaust Rescuer Varian Fry |
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A large crowd of local residents and dignitaries was on hand as the town of Ridgewood, New Jersey named a street after its most famous native son, Holocaust rescuer Varian Fry, on June 26, 2005. |
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Cartoonists Against the Holocaust: Then and Now |
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Wyman Institute Briefs Congress on U.S. Failure to Bomb Auschwitz
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© 2005, The David S. Wyman Institute for Holocaust Studies