The National Committee for the Furtherance of Jewish Education said today that it has filed suit in U.S. District Court against News day, Long Island’s largest daily newspaper, for its refusal to accept an advertisement denouncing intermarriage by Jews. The group said it was also suing the U.S. government “for giving News day preferential mailing privileges and free space in government buildings.”
The advertisement claimed that Jewish intermarriage, if unchecked, was tantamount to “suicide, national and personal,” for the Jewish people. It was published last week in the New York Times and the New York Post Rabbi Jacob J. Hecht, executive vice-president of the committee, said it “has taken an active drive to stem the tide of intermarriage that threatens the very next generation of Jewish existence in America and to bring a measure of Jewish identity to a searching, but lost generation of college youth.” He said that to further the committee’s campaign “we have gone to the media trying to reach those susceptible to the worst form of Jewish self-destruction.” The ad refused by News day exhorted Jews to “be Jewish.” It solicited funds to further the committee’s efforts.
The committee accused News day of running ads “facilitating interfaith marriages by ordained clergymen and ads advocating the philosophy of ‘Jews for Jesus.'”
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