Call for Olympics Boycott Divides Jewish Groups

A call for Jews not to attend the Beijing Olympics because of China's policies in Tibet and Sudan is dividing the Jewish community and prompting stern warnings that such a boycott could lead to a backlash.

Almost 200 rabbis and Jewish leaders signed on to a statement issued last week arguing that the Beijing Games "are not kosher" because of China's "complicity in severe human rights abuses abroad and at home."

The statement, which was circulated by two Orthodox rabbis, Irving Greenberg and Haskel Lookstein, won the endorsement of the American Jewish Congress. The call also has the backing of a broad range of Jewish leaders, including the president of the Union for Reform Judaism, Rabbi Eric Yoffie; the chancellor of Yeshiva University, Rabbi Norman Lamm, and the executive vice president of the Rabbinical Assembly, Conservative Judaism's association of rabbis, Rabbi Joel Meyers. New Yorkers backing the statement included Mayor Koch, Rabbi Rolando Matalon of Manhattan's Upper West Side, Rabbi Avi Weiss of Riverdale, and Rabbis Andrew Bachman and Carie Carter of Park Slope, Brooklyn.

Six Jewish organizations moved swiftly to reject the suggestion of a boycott. In separate but similar statements on Thursday and Friday, the American Jewish Committee, the Anti-Defamation League, B'nai B'rith International, the National Council of Young Israel, the Orthodox Union, and Agudath Israel of America all spoke out against the idea.

"I think people were taken aback," the executive vice chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, Malcolm Hoenlein, told The New York Sun yesterday. He said his group did not organize the response but that individual organizations had consulted about the need to reply to the widely circulated boycott call. "The statements are similar because the reactions were similar," he said.

Mr. Hoenlein said the proponents of a boycott misstated China's record on missile sales, made specious claims about a China-Hamas connection, and went too far by invoking the specter of the 1936 games the Nazis hosted in Berlin. "Even some of the signatories did not agree with the content and reference to the '36 Olympics," he said.

Mr. Hoenlein also said Jews need to be wary of athletic boycotts. "It sounds a lot like what always happens with sporting events involving Israelis," he said. Asked if Jewish groups had been in contact with Chinese officials about the issue, Mr. Hoenlein said, "I can say they were not happy." A spokesman for the Chinese Embassy in Washington had no comment for this article.

"There are a lot of bad things about China, but we don't think targeting a superpower as an enemy of human rights is what a group of rabbis ought to be doing," Rabbi Avi Shafran of Agudath Israel said. "Anytime a superpower is challenged by a country or an ethnic group and painted with a broad brush, it always carries the potential for negative repercussions, political, re: Israel, or economic, vis-à-vis business."

An official with the American Jewish Committee, Jason Isaacson, said his group's chief concern was that the proposed protest would be ineffective. "Screaming at the top of your lungs or taking out an ad or advocating a boycott of a major international event taking place on Chinese soil does not represent the only way or even the best way to achieve a result," he said.

Among the groups rejecting a boycott, the ADL used the harshest language towards China. "While there is no doubt that China has an extremely poor human rights record and that its actions in Tibet and Sudan are to be condemned, we believe that asking the Jewish community to engage in a boycott of the games could be counterproductive and would not produce any tangible result," the organization said.

A prominent Jewish businessman, Maurice Greenberg, wrote that he was "angered" by the proposed boycott. "Economic and social inclusion has always been the most powerful agent of change and builder of mutual trust," Mr. Greenberg, the chairman and CEO of C.V. Starr & Co. Inc. and former head of American International Group Inc., wrote in a heated commentary posted yesterday on the Web site of Forbes magazine under the headline, "Jews: Don't Boycott the Olympics!" "No one is going to successfully bully a powerful country like China. … I can see nothing to be achieved by policies of isolation, ostracism and boycotts," he wrote.

Mr. Greenberg, who has been involved in business deals in China for decades, praised China's history as a refuge for Jews. He mentioned Tibet only in passing, made no reference to China's extensive ties to Sudan, and minimized the notion that minorities in China are persecuted. "The constitution and laws of the People's Republic of China guarantee equal rights to all ethnic groups today," the business leader wrote.

Rabbi Lookstein said yesterday that critics were exaggerating and overreacting to the pronouncement that attending the Olympics was "not kosher."

"We were not out to declare war on China," he said. "We wanted to make a statement to Americans and American Jews that we are sensitive to the suffering of people in Darfur and in Tibet and possible victims of Iran in the future." Rabbi Lookstein said he was aware of no misstatement in his claims about China's ties to Syria, Iran, and Hamas. He also emphasized that the call to stay away from the Olympics was directed only at tourists and not athletes or businessmen. "We don't use the word 'boycott,'" he said. "We feel spending discretionary funds on fun and games in China is ignoring some very serious violations of human rights. … We know what that's like as Jews."

A spokesman for the Israeli Embassy in Washington did not return a call yesterday seeking comment for this story. However, the head of Israel's Olympic Committee, Efraim Singer, reportedly said last month that he objected to boycott efforts proposed by Tibet activists and others. Mr. Singer warned against attempts "mix politics with sports," according to the Argentina-based Agencia Judía de Noticias.