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The Times

London, March 17, 2007


Churchill's views on the Jews

Sir, -- Stephen Pollard accuses me of peddling a "silly story . . . of little intrinsic interest" about Winston Churchill's attitude to the Jews ( comment, March 12 ). The story relates to an article called How the Jews Can Combat Persecution, which was commissioned from Churchill in 1937.

The facts are these. Churchill, who frequently used ghostwriters, asked a man called Adam Marshall Diston to write the piece, and provided him with some suggestions as to what to include. Diston then wrote it.

Pollard asserts that at this point "Churchill took one look at it and refused to have it published because he disagreed with it". That is not true. As I explain in my book Lloyd George and Churchill: Rivals for Greatness, Churchill actively sought to have it published in the US magazine Liberty .

He was prevented from doing so because of contractual problems. He then submitted it to the British magazine Strand , but it rejected the piece because it had already accepted an article by David Lloyd George on the same theme.

Churchill was entirely happy to put the article out in his own name and thus take responsibility for the views it expressed. It was not published in 1937 because of a series of accidents, not because Churchill disagreed with the contents. In 1940, when the question of publication arose again, he decided not to go ahead. We do not know if he had changed his views, only that, according to his secretary, "Mr Churchill thinks it would be inadvisable to publish the article. . . at the present time".

Richard Toye
Homerton College
Cambridge

 

Free download: David Irving, "Churchill's War", vol. i: "The Struggle for Power"
 
The origins of antisemitism
Other examples
Mustn't say that: Churchill's 1937 warnings about the 'Hebrew bloodsuckers' revealed: "the Jew is 'different'. He looks different. He thinks differently" | "... they are inviting persecution ... partly responsible" for their sufferings | British politicians denied Jews special treatment - and 'antisemitic' Churchill claims rebuffed | Churchill was accused of being 'too fond of the Jews' says Martin Gilbert | David Irving's biography explains the fondness (a large sum of money having changed hands in 1936)
Commentary: Was Churchill Anti-Semitic- And Does It Matter? Churchill exonerated By: Rafael Medoff in The Bulletin
Breitbart comments
Flashback: Churchill's 1920 article on Stalin's Jewish torturers
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