Bruce DeBoskey Honored as "Very Important Person"
Intermountain Jewish News

Date: October 26, 2007
By: CHRIS LEPPEK IJN Assistant Editor

This article originally appeared in the October 26, 2007 edition of the Intermountain Jewish News.

After five years in the well-trodden trenches of the Anti-Defamation League, Bruce DeBoskey admits that he’s learned a thing or two.

“I know a lot of things now that I didn’t know then,” he says of 2002, when he left his private law practice to accept the position as director of the ADL’s Mountain States Region, based in Denver.

“First and foremost, I’ve gained a great depth of understanding about this virus of anti-Semitism that keeps mutating over time,” he says. “And I understand to a greater degree how truly persistent and pernicious and pervasive anti-Semitism is.”

It’s not that DeBoskey was a stranger to the concept. He had experienced a degree of anti-Semitism in his youth. His subsequent work as a courtroom attorney who tried many civil rights cases exposed him to the phenomenon and its close cousins, racism and sexism.

“But I didn’t really understand,” he begins in a characteristically thoughtful but enthusiastic way, “the degree to which this virus just continues to evolve over millennia, to rear its ugly head, even since I’ve been here in this leadership position. It’s a very persistent, very tenacious virus. It affects the human condition and doesn’t show any signs of abating.”

Anti-Semitism is his sworn enemy, and DeBoskey is not one to underestimate his foe. As he discusses it, his respect for its tenacity and ability to change is obvious. His respect for the rightness and eventual victory of his own cause, however, is even greater.

“If I didn’t think that eventually we could eradicate this virus, it would be much harder to come to work. I think, and those whom I respect in this organization also think, that our work is about finding the antidote for this virus.”

He pauses, smiles and raises a finger to drive home his point.

“And what is that antidote? It’s education. It’s ultimately teaching people about inclusiveness, about respect, about diversity, about how we build a community, a state, a nation, a world, where our differences are respected. And I have hope that that can be achieved. If I didn’t, then it would be pretty hard to get up in the morning.”

Without a clear and worthy goal in sight, however distant it may be, the work of ADL and other organizations like it would amount to little more than a band-aid, DeBoskey says.

“If all we were doing was putting our finger in a dike, as opposed to building a community, building respect, building inclusiveness, then that wouldn’t be enough. I think we have to do both and I think ADL does both. At times, all we’re doing is trying to keep the water out, but at other times a lot of our work is focused on creating community, creating inclusiveness and creating understanding and respect.”

It’s a good, even a noble, cause, but it doesn’t come easy. Another thing DeBoskey has learned in his tenure at ADL to date is that a willingness to fight is a necessary part of the skill set.

Although he doesn’t outwardly resemble any stereotypical images of a “fighter” — DeBoskey consistently comes across as a genuinely nice guy — he clearly is not one to shy away from confrontation.

“You have to be a fighter in this job,” he says with a decidedly non-combative smile. “You have to be willing to stick your neck out there and do the right thing, and say the right thing, even if it’s painful or tough, and the ADL does that.”

DeBoskey says he didn’t hesitate when he was offered his current position and insists that he has never once looked back with regretful nostalgia at his old days as a litigator.

“This job has been a remarkable fit for who I am as a person,” he says. “I’m a passionate man with a strong Jewish identity with a huge commitment to social justice and civil rights, and a willingness to fight for what I believe in. So the chance for me to go from what I was doing to what I am doing was a seamless transition for me personally.”

That’s not to say that the learning curve hasn’t been considerable, he qualifies.

“There have been many challenges, of course. Getting to know this large Jewish community. Getting to know the ADL family and getting to understand the ADL organization between here and New York and the other regional offices. Learning about fundraising. Learning about when to speak and when not to speak and how to speak, and communicating with media and leadership. All of these have been challenges, but they’ve all been part of an evolution that’s now been going on for over five years that continues to this day to fit who I am, where I am and where I want to go.”

All of it follows what DeBoskey describes as a logical and productive professional path for him. His earlier work in law provided valuable on-the-job training for what he is doing today.

“My background as a trial lawyer has helped me and continues to help me,” he says. “It helps me sort through the facts. It helps me to build consensus. It helps me know which fights to pick. It helps me know how to engage in the battles. All those are skills that I learned initially in the courtroom.”

And over the past five years, DeBoskey adds, there has been plentiful opportunity to put those skills to practical use. The ever-evolving hydra of anti-Semitism rears its many heads in novel and once-unexpected places.

Asked to provide examples of the battles he has fought, and still fights, DeBoskey suggests looking at any newspaper on any given day.

“Look at today’s news,” he advises, “and that’s true on almost any day, whether it’s Ahmadinejad, or whether it’s Mearsheimer and Walt, or whether it’s Jimmy Carter, or whether it’s Mel Gibson, or, or, or. . .”

The instances of anti-Semitism, he says, are legion.

“If there are people in the community who don’t think that anti-Semitism is alive and well and kicking today, a) they’re not paying attention, or b) they’re not listening to what’s happening here at the ADL office every day when the phone rings.”

In the trenches, DeBoskey says, indicating with his arms the walls of the ADL office in which he is sitting, there’s no hiding from the fact, no chance for comforting denial.

“People should come and hear the calls we get in this office, in this community, on at least a weekly and sometimes a daily basis,” he says, “about how anti-Semitism is finding its way into schools or the workplace or government or some other institution in our society.

“It’s here. It’s not what it was in 1913. It’s not the same kind of thing. The virus has changed. It mutates constantly, but it’s out there and our job is to continue to adapt and to refuse to be a host.”

In keeping tabs on anti-Semites, DeBoskey has learned that there is a degree of irony in the work that ADL does. A striking example is the way that the American left, once the staunchest of Israel’s and American Jewry’s allies, is today often singing an entirely different tune.

Two books that have surfaced in the past year, The Israel Lobby, by academics Stephen Walt and John Mearsheimer, and Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid, by former Democratic president Jimmy Carter, represent examples of what DeBoskey considers a disturbing form of left-wing anti-Zionism.

“I think we’re now facing in the last year with Mearsheimer and Walt and President Carter, a real challenge,” he says. “The fact that these people can actually, wrongly, accuse those who support Israel as [taking] a selfish direction for America’s foreign policy in Israel’s best interest, is really frightening. It’s not true — the facts aren’t there to support that.”

This new anti-Zionism is really not a new phenomenon, DeBoskey says. It is yet another example of the “mutation” to which he refers.

“It fans this fire of one of the oldest anti-Semitic themes — dual loyalty — this charge that somehow Jews are more loyal to a foreign entity; that you can’t trust your Jewish neighbors to look out for your best interests. It’s one that Hitler used and it’s being used now. It’s a really vicious, historic theme that we’ve seen for hundreds of years and we’re seeing it back again. The virus has mutated again and it’s getting a lot of attention.”

Whether or not this renewed charge of Jewish dual loyalty stems from anti-Semitic motivation on the part of its authors, DeBoskey adds, “their accusation fans the flame, it fuels the fire of anti-Semitism.”

DeBoskey realizes how tricky this territory can be. Jews must strike a very fine balance between defending their own rights while respecting the rights of free speech of others, whether or not that speech is offensive to Jews, he says.

“It’s certainly possible to be against the policies of the government of Israel. It’s certainly possible to be critical of Israel without being anti-Semitic. If you want to see criticism of Israeli politics, just go to the streets of Tel Aviv. There are Israelis, who certainly are not anti-Semitic, who are against Israeli policies.

“But when you get into anti-Zionism, then you get into the question of whether or not the Jewish people, unlike any other people on earth, have a right to nationalism and their own safe and secure state. That becomes a much trickier question. If you begin to say that only Jews can’t have their own place of safety, their own nation — only Jews, the only people in the world — then that begins to have a smell to it. It needs a much deeper explanation.”

President Carter’s argument that Israelis and Palestinians should live together in a peaceful binational state is another left-wing argument that quickly dissolves under close scrutiny, DeBoskey adds.

“The demography of the region shows that a binational state means no Jewish state. And if you don’t believe that Jews historically have a right to their own place of safety, given how Israel was formed, out of what need Israel was created nearly 60 years ago, then you’re getting scary. You’ve got to look really closely at what’s behind those kinds of attitudes.”

The expression of such attitudes is certainly permissible, DeBoskey clarifies, but they must be called for what they are. That is one of ADL’s most important responsibilities, in his opinion.

“Sometimes it is a cloak for anti-Semitism and sometimes it’s not,” he says.

“That’s why you have to look at each case. What’s the motivation? What’s the belief system? But when you isolate Jews, when you apply a double standard just to Jews, then you have to ask questions about what’s behind that double standard.”

Meanwhile, all the trouble with the left does not free the ADL, nor DeBoskey, from its obligations regarding the right.

Although conservative America generally supports Israel with a passion, its domestic agenda very often clashes with what ADL feels is best for American Jewry.

Issues concerning the separation of church and state — and the Christian right’s persistent efforts to narrow that wall of separation — “is an omnipresent challenge,” DeBoskey says.

“The church-state battle today is fierce. It’s being waged at every level of government and politics and I strongly believe that not only the Jewish community but all communities of faith need to be vigilant and protective of the wall of separation between church and state in order to ensure the religious freedom that has made this country so wonderfully open to people of faith and people of no faith.”

DeBoskey realizes that Colorado is an important state for the fundamentalist Christian community, with Focus on the Family and other influential religious bodies based in Colorado Springs, and he has made efforts to be in contact with those organizations.

“The first thing you do is establish a relationship,” he says. “You sit down and break bread with people with whom you have some agreements, and with whom you have none. You talk about the things that you agree about and about the things that you don’t agree about, but what’s most important is to talk about those disagreements, to begin to have a dialogue.”

Again, a fine balance must be struck, he says — in this case, between recognizing the support that the American Jewish community and Israel receive from the Christian right and expressing disagreement over contentious issues.

“We’ve been doing that here in this state, quietly and consistently, with the leadership of the religious right in order to try to at least have a conversation on those issues that we agree on. Support for Israel is one of them.

“There are some religious freedom issues that we agree on — the religious right would absolutely agree that government has no place telling them how to pray or what to believe or how to worship, for example.

“On issues of women’s right to choose, gay rights, civil unions — on those issues we’re just not going to agree. But at least we could have dialogue, we could have discussion. At least we can learn how to communicate with each other.”

DeBoskey has met with executives of Focus on the Family — although not yet with its president, James Dobson — and has expressed the Jewish community’s thanks for its support of Israel.

“But not to trade that support for our own religious freedoms,” he emphasizes, “for the precious values that are core to our community’s, and the broader community’s, success.”

That spirit of open dialogue with those with whom the ADL disagrees is almost, but not entirely, a universal principle, DeBoskey says. There are limits.

“I don’t have a whole lot to say to the white supremacist folks,” he concedes. “There isn’t a lot of dialogue there.”

So far, DeBoskey’s stint as regional director has been lively in terms of sparring with anti-Semites and assorted others, although — thankfully, he says — not as violent as a couple of decades ago.

“Thank G-d we haven’t had the violence locally that was present with the skinheads and the Order when Alan Berg was murdered.

“But we’ve seen some pretty powerful expressions of anti-Semitism: the Lovingway Church sign on Colorado Blvd. that Jews killed Christ. We’ve had knock-down, drag-out fights with the religious right on church-state issues in this state. We’ve had swastikas on synagogues. We’ve had anti-Israel sentiment crossing the line into anti-Semitism. We’ve had visits from grand muftis of Jerusalem with very dangerous ramifications.”

The battles DeBoskey has fought have been different from those waged by his predecessors Sheldon Steinhauser and Saul Rosenthal, which only goes to support his theory that anti-Semitism is constantly changing.

“It’s been challenging in different ways,” he says. “We didn’t have to worry about making country clubs or hotels open to Jews. It was a different time when Shelly was here, a different time when Saul was here. But again, these issues change, they evolve, some mature, some die, some new ones are born. But what I’ve seen in five years is that we haven’t yet found an antidote for this virus.”

Predicting the future of something as complex as anti-Semitism is tough, DeBoskey admits, but he promises that ADL will do everything in its power to stay ahead of the curve.

“We’re constantly looking at what’s happening in order to anticipate what’s next,” he says.

“Let me say that the white supremacist movement in this country is by no means dormant. The Ku Klux Klan is having a resurgence in membership. The white supremacist organizations in our state are active and organizing. They’re not large but they’re potent. I can’t say how they’re going to rear their ugly head, but they’re out there. They’re working and organizing and we’re paying very close attention to what they do.

“And we’re seeing with the anti-immigration movement that they’re growing in terms of the use of racist ideologies and xenophobic ideas. Attitudes and beliefs inform action and what we’re seeing is a lot of beliefs being espoused about the Jewish lobby, Jewish control, Jewish influence and we’re paying very close attention.”

Whatever the issues that challenge him in the future, DeBoskey says, he looks forward to meeting them. He believes that anti-Semitism today is worse than it has been since the end of the Holocaust, yet evinces no fear in anticipating it.

He projects the same calm enthusiasm when discussing the demonization of Israel, church-state issues and the educational antidotes he looks forward to using in those skirmishes.

Nor does he shy away from highlighting and condemning what he sees as the Jewish community’s own internecine discrimination — making a rare public statement in support of the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender communities.

A willingness to upbraid his own community, applying the same criteria that he applies to other groups, says a lot about the philosophy that drives Bruce DeBoskey.

“I’m concerned that our community has ignored and in many cases rejected GLBT members of the Jewish community,” he says. “There is reported to be over 5,000 Jewish members of the GLBT community who are not welcome in many synagogues and many Jewish institutions. We aren’t doing a good enough job as a community to reach out and be inclusive to our own.”

DeBoskey pauses and wraps it up, no longer smiling as he delivers his final line.

“That’s just wrong,” he says. “It’s wrong for all the reasons relevant to our mission at ADL.”