Einstein Hospital Officials, Jewish Groups Say There is No Evidence That Staffer Was Hitler Youth Me

The president of the Northern Division of Einstein Medical Center and a number of Jewish organizations said this week that there is no evidence to substantiate allegations that one of its staff members was once in the Hitler Youth, it was reported in the Jewish Exponent and there was no basis for dismissing the staffer.

Members and sympathizers of the Jewish Defense League picketed outside the Center this week to protest the presence on the medical staff of Dr. Horst Gunther Seydel. Bonnie Pechter, JDL national director, told reporters that the JDL was demanding that the hospital authorities ask for Seydel’s resignation.

According to Ms. Pechter, the Germanborn radiologist, 47, had served in the Hitler Youth from 1939, when he was 11, until the war ended, when he was 16. She said the JDL did not question Seydel’s professional competence, but objected to the fact that he served on the staff of what “is still basically a Jewish hospital, supported by Jewish money, with Jewish patients and Jewish doctors.”

EXHAUSTIVE PROBE WAS CONDUCTED

Medical Center President Raymond S. Alexander said in a prepared statement that the division had been “informed indirectly of allegations” made by the JDL. “Similar allegations had been made by anonymous sources last year prior to the physician’s appointment to the medical staff,” Alexander continued. “An exhaustive investigation was made by a committee of the Northern Division medical staff. This committee found no evidence to substantiate the

Similar statements were issued by Sheldon Wengel, the hospital’s public relations director, and Ronald Winter, the Center’s vice-president and general counsel. Wengel said: “This man has an outstanding reputation; he’s beyond reproach as an individual. This is a fine physician.” Winter stated that there was no evidence to substantiate charges that Seydel had ever participated in any action that could be construed as anti-Semitic.

Dr. Harold J. Isard, chairman emeritus of the Center’s radiology division, who hired Seydel in November, 1975, reaffirmed his faith in his choice, the Jewish Exponent reported. Seydel served on the staffs of both Jeanes and American Oncologic hospitals for eight years prior to applying to fill a staff vacancy in the Northern Division.

CHARGES MCCARTHY TACTICS BY JDL

A statement on this issue was released by the Jewish Community Relations Council and the local offices of the American Jewish Committee, American Jewish Congress, Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith and the Jewish Labor Committee. It said:

“The memory of the six million Jewish martyrs of the Holocaust is a vivid and personal one for all Jews. The horrors of the genocide carried out against European Jewry have been impressed indelibly upon the Jewish group memory. Because of this, we consistently have demanded that justice be carried out against those who committed crimes against the Jewish community.

“We do not believe that a Jewish agency should employ any individual who bears responsibility for the human tragedy of the Holocaust. It appears to us, based on the facts available, that Dr. Seydel played no role in activities against Jews, and we believe that Einstein Medical Center has made a responsible decision after an examination of the information available.”

Arnold Harris, JCRC executive director, told the Jewish Exponent that JDL’s call for Seydel’s resignation without any evidence of wrongdoing on his part “is a revival of the witch-hunting tactics of the McCarthy era.”