O
ver the course of many years, I’ve written repeatedly about the biases and mendacity of the New York Times. In a 2011 column, for example, I wrote that “the New York Times’ track record for bias against Israel and Jews, especially the religious kind, is, sadly, quite well-established. From its morally contemptible silence during the Holocaust to as recently as this month, when it referred to the victims of the Itamar horror as ‘settlers’ — yes, even the little ones, a four-year-old and a three-month old — there’s a palpable coldheartedness, or worse, in its writing about us.”

And in 2016, I penned the following: “A terrifying image from earlier in Jewish history is that of the Eastern European priests who would use their Sunday sermons to rile up the church-going faithful against the Jews. But even here, we’re apparently not entirely free of clerics seeking to whip up frenzies against the Jews. The clerics to whom I refer are those who populate the New York Times editorial board. Former top Times editor, Jill Abramson, after all, spoke for many of its staff and readers when she confided that “in her house growing up, the Times substituted for religion,” which would make its board the analog of a council of church elders. Last week, that council issued an ecclesiastic pronouncement, otherwise known as an “editorial,” regarding a terrible, horrible, no-good near-crime that is set to take place in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn this summer. Four times a week, for a total of six hours, a municipal swimming pool there will be open to women only…. .”

So I’m far from a milquetoast when it comes to leveling piercing critique of the New York Times. But I also try to keep in mind that I need to be factually accurate and fair-minded and have a constructive purpose in mind: Sometimes we need to put the Gray Lady on notice that its bias is showing and its charges will not go unanswered.

With this in mind, I feel moved to comment on the recent firestorm surrounding the blatantly anti-Semitic cartoon that appeared on the op-ed page of the Times’ international edition. Universal condemnation followed, and the newspaper’s initial response was tepid, an editor’s note stating that “it was an error of judgment to publish” an “offensive” image that “included anti-Semitic tropes.” This was followed by a stronger but still inadequate apology expressing that it was “deeply sorry” for the cartoon and promising significant internal changes.

Responding to that response, Times opinion columnist Bret Stephens published a stinging column, writing that this wasn’t “just an error of judgment”:

The problem with the cartoon isn’t that its publication was a willful act of anti-Semitism. It wasn’t. The problem is that its publication was an astonishing act of ignorance of anti-Semitism — and that, at a publication that is otherwise hyper-alert to nearly every conceivable expression of prejudice…. How have even the most blatant expressions of anti-Semitism become almost undetectable to editors who think it’s part of their job to stand up to bigotry?

I’m writing this column conscious of the fact that it is unusually critical of the newspaper in which it appears, and it is a credit to the paper that it is publishing it. I have now been with the Times for two years and I’m certain that the charge that the institution is in any way anti-Semitic is a calumny.

Two days later, the Times published an editorial about the “appalling” cartoon. Some excerpts:

The appearance of such an obviously bigoted cartoon in a mainstream publication is evidence of a profound danger — not only of anti-Semitism but of numbness to its creep, to the insidious way this ancient, enduring prejudice is once again working itself into public view and common conversation….

Anti-Zionism can clearly serve as a cover for anti-Semitism — and some criticism of Israel, as the cartoon demonstrated, is couched openly in anti-Semitic terms…. In the 1930s and the 1940s, the Times was largely silent as anti-Semitism rose up and bathed the world in blood. That failure still haunts this newspaper. Now, rightly, the Times has declared itself “deeply sorry” for the cartoon and called it “unacceptable.”

Apologies are important, but the deeper obligation of the Times is to focus on leading through unblinking journalism and the clear editorial expression of its values. Society in recent years has shown healthy signs of increased sensitivity to other forms of bigotry, yet somehow anti-Semitism can often still be dismissed as a disease gnawing only at the fringes of society. That is a dangerous mistake. As recent events have shown, it is a very mainstream problem.

As the world once again contends with this age-old enemy, it is not enough to refrain from empowering it. It is necessary to stand in opposition.

A day prior to the editorial, Rabbi Yisroel Goldstein conveyed his thoughts on the Poway tragedy on the Times’ opinion page. Subsequently, the newspaper’s publisher informed his staff that disciplinary measures had been taken against the production editor who selected the cartoon for publication and would update its “unconscious bias training” to focus directly on anti-Semitism. It also discontinued the syndication service that had provided the image to it.

I’ve been reading the Times for many years now and have no illusions about its editorial stances and biases (yet I’m mindful as well that it has an ever-changing editorial staff of hundreds, and that some of them are fair-minded individuals who’ve written things about frum Jews and Yiddishkeit that are respectful, even admiring).

But for at least as long, I’ve also been reading and listening to the words of our gedolei Torah about how a Jew is to act in galus, even in this wonderful medinah shel chesed where we’re ostensibly able to freely express opinions. And I believe the counsel of these Torah leaders would be that when a newspaper of great influence, based in America’s largest Jewish community, responds, even belatedly, with a full apology and follows up with concrete measures, we ought to concede this; not necessarily celebrate it — the Times’ own egregiousness, after all, made it all necessary — but to accept and acknowledge it. If you think otherwise, perhaps you can ask your rav what he remembers learning from his Torah mentors.

It’s immaterial whether the Times’ editors are really, truly sorry, and whether, as they wrote, they’ve actually “been and remain stalwart supporters of Israel [engaged in] good-faith criticism.” The fact is the newspaper made a full-throated mea culpa, including several important acknowledgments — that anti-Semitism can masquerade as anti-Zionism, and that anti-Semitism is a mainstream, not fringe, problem, which we must actively, vociferously oppose. We in turn ought to display the courage — and yes, it takes courage — to acknowledge that.

But if we savage the Times and then, when it actually responds appropriately, we ignore it — refusing, as it were, to take “yes” for an answer — we show that we’re caught up in the same zero-sum outrage culture engulfing so much of society these days. Then we’re sending a message that no amount of contrition or amends will matter, and that ultimately, we’re not even interested in the Times treating us more fairly; we seek only to rage impotently. And that’s not how Torah Jews ought to respond.

Are we to protest outside the Times’ headquarters alongside Alan Dershowitz — who, when last I wrote about him, was busy putting Avraham Avinu on trial for the Akeidah in front of a thousand secular Jews at Reform’s Skirball Center? Or are we to look for leadership to such Orthodox rabbis who publish articles calling the Times “der New York Stürmer” (which is far different from saying, as Stephens did, that the cartoon “in another age, might have been published in the pages of Der Stürmer”)? Perhaps someone should ask such rabbis, too, which adam gadol they consult on these issues. Because we’re not rage monkeys with skullcaps. We’re Yidden, and we answer to a Higher Source.

Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 760. Eytan Kobre may be contacted directly at kobre@mishpacha.com