It was about Time(s)

From 1939 until 1945, The New York Times published 1,186 stories pertaining to the atrocities committed against the Jews in Europe. However, only 26 of these made the front page and almost none referred to the Jews as “the primary victims” (Fischel). Since the mid-1940s, many scholars have debated The New York Times’ and other American newspapers’ failure to expose the Holocaust to the American people. Many have come to the conclusion that, although there was a substantial amount of coverage on the Holocaust, The New York Times did not cover it to the full extent and treated the “destruction of the Jews as a second story” (Fischel). Unfortunately, while The New York Times had the ability and responsibility to report on the Holocaust, it failed to adequately do so due to the lack of believability of the stories, and the publisher’s personal issues.

The New York Times was among the most qualified and best suited to emphasize the Holocaust and inform the American people of the atrocities. Since it was founded in 1851, the Times has held a “longtime commitment to international affairs”. Along with this, it had a vast amount of Jewish leadership within it, making it perfect to report on the Holocaust (Leff, How the NYT Missed the Story). Deborah Libstadt once said, “Press bears a great measure of responsibility for the public’s skepticism and ignorance of the scope of the wartime tradgedy” (Fischel). This statement relates to The New York Times because their failure to do just that and live up to their responsibility, took a major toll on the American population’s knowledge of foreign affairs. Along with the professional resources available to the Times, the many Jewish employees at the paper, including the publisher Arthur Hays Sulz...

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...the American people will never be forgotten and we will never know how many lives may have been saved if things did indeed go the right way.

Works Cited

Fischel, Jack. "Sins of Omission: How the New York Times Didn't Report the Holocaust." The Weekly Standard 11 Apr. 2005: 38+. Opposing Viewpoints Resource Center. Web. 25 Feb. 2012.

Leff, Laurel. Buried by the Times: The Holocaust and America's Most Important Newspaper. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge UP, 2005. Print.

Leff, Laurel. "How the NYT Missed the Story of the Holocaust While It Was Happening." History News Network. George Mason University, 4 Apr. 2005. Web. 19 Mar. 2012. .

Shapiro, Robert Moses. Why Didn't the Press Shout?: American & International Journalism during the Holocaust. Hoboken, NJ: Yeshiva Univ. in Association with KTAV Pub. House, 2003. Print.