Just days after an email to 75,000 Pennsylvania Jews suggested that a vote for Barack Obama could cause another Holocaust, at least two of the signatories to the letter are distancing themselves from it.
This after the political operative who apparently wrote the letter was fired.
The letter, paid for by the state Republican Party, caused a huge uproar, with e-mails flying back and forth.
Both I. Michael Coslov, the campaign chair of the Jewish Federation of Greater Philadelphia, and Sandra Schultz Newman, a former state supreme court justice, are distancing themselves from the letter, saying they hadn’t actually read its contents before signing on.
Coslov said he doesn’t think Obama is “right for the Jewish people, but I don’t think he’s going to cause another Holocaust.”
Newman issued an apology to those who had e-mailed her objecting to the letter.
“I regret that I did not carefully review the final draft before it was released with my signature,” she wrote. “Some of the language was inappropriate and intemporate. I apologize to anyone who was offended by this misguided e-mail.”
But another Republican salvo continued the theme over the weekend. The Republican Jewish Coalition mobilized volunteers to distribute leaflets in heavily Jewish neighborhoods in suburban Philadelphia. The glossy leaflets also referenced the Holocaust indirectly.
Featuring a photo of Obama speaking in Germany, the sheet said: “Concerned about Obama? You should be. History has shown that a naive and weak foreign policy has resulted in tragic outcomes for the Jewish people.”
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