Democratic Vice Presidential candidate Geraldine Feraro today accused President Reagan of a “disgraceful falsehood” when he asserted last week at a political rally in a North Woodmere, Long Island synagogue that the leadership of the Demo cratic Party lacked the “moral courage” to denounce anti-Semitism. “President Reagan’s remark is contradicted by the whole history of my party, “Rep. Ferraro declared.”It was a Democratic President, Franklin D. Roosevelt, who led this nation in the fight against the Nazis.
“It was a great Democrat, President Harry Truman, who recognized the Jewish State of Israel just a half hour after that nation came into being. It was a trio of courageous Democrats — John Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson and Hubert Humphrey — who led the battle against all forms of discrimination and fought for the civil rights of every American.”
Feraro’s speech today was before an overflow crowd of 1,200 assembled at the Congregation Kehilath Jershurun in Manhattan, arranged under the auspices of the Jewish Community Relations Council of New York and the New York Board of Rabbis, the association of Orthodox, Conservative and Reform rabbis. Her 25-minute speech was interrupted numerous times by opplause.
HITS REAGAN FOR HIS HOLOCAUST REMARK
The Vice Presidential candidate also rebuked Reagan for asserting last week that the U.S. sent the marine forces into Lebanon to prevent another Holocaust of Jews. “I don’t know which is more troubling, the President’s ignorance of the facts or his cynical exploitation of the Holocaust,” Ferraro asserted.
Continuing Ferraro added: “The plain fact is that marines were sent into Beirut for the first time (in 1982) not to protect Israel but to oversee and protect the safe withdrawal of the Palestine Liberation Organization from that city. Does he (Reagan) think we have forgotten that?”
On the issue of the separation of church and state, Ferraro charged the Reagan Administration with having given “a platform in this campaign” to such “moral monopolists” as the Rev. Jerry Falwell, head of the Moral Majority, and the Rev. James Rabison, who delivered the invocation at the Republican national convention in Dallas last August. “These individuals have not been spurned by the Republican Party,” she declared. “They have been welcomed into it.”
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
