A Letter Sent But Not Published

To the Jerusalem Post Magazine:

There is a pitfall is writing a negative letter about a book based only on a review column while not even leafing through the book and I fear Marion Reiss has taken a tumble (Letter, Dec. 20). She is angry at Janet Levy for noting Rafael Medoff's charge against President Roosevelt that he was antisemitic, Reiss calling it "gratuitous" and without "substantiation". 

But Medoff's The Jews Should Keep Quiet does indeed prove it from FDR's own writings and decisions. It's all in the book and he has published portions of his factual proof in columns even in the JPost which she also seems not to have read.

Worse, she discounts the claim based on one act of kindness Eleanor Roosevelt did for her aunt. Mrs. Roosevelt was her own person and often disagreed with her husband's policies, especially regarding Jews and Israel. is Moreover, Reiss surely knows FDR was a philanderer who carried on an affair with his secretary Lucy Mercer. There was Marguerite 'Missy' LeHand and Dorothy Schiff as well. Is that the type of person an Orthodox woman really would presume couldn't be an anti-Semite?

Can I suggest Reiss be civil, cease hurling epithets and search out historical accuracy by at least reading Medoff's book?

BTW, Marion Reiss is a frequent letter-to-the-editor writer at the paper.

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