WATERTOWN, Mass. — The city of Newburyport last week formally withdrew from the Anti Defamation League’s (ADL) No Place for Hate (NPFH) program, reported the Armenian National Committee (ANC).
Newburyport has become Massachusetts’ 11th municipality to end relations with the NPFH program due to the ADL’s failure to unambiguously acknowledge the Armenian Genocide and its continued active opposition to legislation affirming the Armenian Genocide.
“We are pleased that the North Shore has joined so many other cities and towns in Massachusetts in standing firmly opposed to genocide denial in any of its form,” stated Pearl Teague, chairperson of the ANC of Merrimack Valley. “We are grateful to the commitment of Lt. Richard Siemasko, Esq. and the members of the Human Rights Commission as well as Mayor Moak who carefully listened to Rev. Aram Marashlian and Judy Mouradian and other local residents and recognized the failure of the ADL to not only live up to its own mission statement but more importantly to live up to the standards of our community.”
In late August, Newburyport’s Commission on Diversity and Tolerance had written an open letter to the ADL and ADL National Director Abraham Foxman stating that “The members of Newburyport’s Commission for Diversity and Tolerance are distraught and dismayed by Mr.Foxman’s and the Anti-Defamation League’s (ADL) stance on the Armenian Genocide. Not only has the ADL failed to support the Armenian people by advocating for congressional recognition with HR 106, but also, in fact, it has lobbied against the legislation.”
The letter continued to say that the commission finds “that the ADL’s logic that led to the statement that a Congressional resolution on such matters is a counterproductive diversion and may put at risk the Turkish-Jewish community and the important multilateral relationship between Turkey, Israel and the United States” is fatally flawed, and contrary to the spirit of “never again.”
In a February 1 letter to the New England ADL, Newburyport Mayor John Moak stated that, “in the wake of the [ADL’s] failure to acknowledge the Armenian Genocide between 1915 and 1923 as anything other than ‘tantamount to genocide,’ the commission has decided to end its relationship with the No Place for Hate program.”
