June (Web-only) 2005

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Don Feder, a former Boston Herald writer and syndicated columnist, is president of Jews Against Anti-Christian Defamation, an advocacy group that started in April. Stan Guthrie, CT's senior associate news editor, interviewed him.

The Jewish people have the Anti-Defamation League, and you have started an "anti-defamation league" for Christians. Why?

The Anti-Defamation League has come up before. It was started more than a hundred years ago to respond to anti-Semitism. Unfortunately, it's changed over time. It's one of many "mainline" organizations that basically have been taken over by liberals. And today, rather than fighting anti-Semitism, per se, a lot of what it does has nothing to do with combating anti-Semitism, but rather promoting the Left's agenda.

When you say "liberals," do you mean political liberals?

Oh, I mean people on the Left. Perhaps I shouldn't even use the term liberal, because they're not liberal in the historic sense of the word—certainly not 19th-century liberals. They're not even liberals in terms of the New Deal. I guess, like many people, I fall into the habit of using the term liberal loosely. Leftist is probably a more accurate description.

At any rate, we formed Jews Against Anti-Christian Defamation because we felt a real need for Jews as Jews to respond to attacks on Christians. Oftentimes when Christians are attacked and Christian organizations object, the response is, "Well you're thin-skinned. You're overly sensitive. Unless people are completely complimentary, you think it's an attack. There's self-interest involved."

With a Jewish organization or a group of Jews taking this position, no one can accuse us of self-interest, because we're not Christians, but we're objecting to attacks on Christians, ...