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Thursday August 30, 2007

Shorts: U. S.

ADL New England director reinstated

The Anti-Defamation League has reinstated Andrew Tarsy as its New England regional director. An ADL spokesman confirmed Monday, Aug. 27 that Tarsy would be rehired, effective immediately.

Tarsy was fired Aug. 17 after publicly breaking ranks with the organization for its refusal to recognize the Armenian genocide. Abraham Foxman, the ADL’s national director, subsequently reversed himself last week, issuing a statement calling the World War I massacres of Armenians “tantamount to genocide.”

Tarsy’s firing set off a mutiny in the New England region, one of the ADL’s most active and influential. The regional board called on Foxman to rehire Tarsy and support a resolution in Congress that would recognize the genocide. Foxman opposes the resolution. — jta

Yeshiva University drops in rankings

Yeshiva University dropped to 52 in the annual U.S. News & World Report college rankings. The flagship institution of Modern Orthodoxy, YU fell eight spots from its 2007 ranking of 44. Mort Lowengrub, the university’s provost and senior vice president for academic affairs, said he was pleased that the school ranked third in New York City, behind Columbia University and New York University. “We’re getting stronger and stronger...,” he said.

He added that “much of our constituency sees the changes that have occurred with” YU’s new president, Richard Joel. “Through his leadership, we’ve been managing to do some very, very exciting things, in both reaching out the Jewish community as well as in really shoring up our academics.”— jta

Pentagon pulls apocalyptic game

The Pentagon stopped delivery of a proselytizing videogame about the apocalypse after a Jewish activist complained.

“Military Religious Freedom,” headed by Mickey Weinstein, a Jewish former Air Force officer, had uncovered a plan by Operation Straight Up, a group that targets U.S. troops for evangelism, to send the “Left Behind: Eternal Forces” game to troops stationed in the Middle East.

“It’s a horrible game because in it you either kill or convert the other side,” Weinstein said in a statement about the game, based on the hugely popular “Left Behind” novel and movie series. The Pentagon last week withdrew its approval of Operation Straight Up’s plans to distribute the game. Muslim groups also complained. — jta

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