Abe Foxman, longtime director of Anti-Defamation League, dies at 86

Abraham H. Foxman, who was a forceful advocate for American Jews as national director of the Anti-Defamation League for nearly three decades, has died, the ADL said Sunday. He was 86. The ADL said in a statement that it “deeply mourns the loss of our longtime national director,” without providing details about where and when Foxman died. Over 28 years as head of the ADL before retiring in 2015, Foxman counseled presidents and diplomats, CEOs and celebrities. He took on prominent figures over antisemitic remarks or representations and accepted any ensuing apologies on behalf of an entire community. “Abe’s voice was heard –- and listened to -– by popes, presidents, and prime ministers, a voice he used wherever Jews were at risk,” Jonathan Greenblatt, ADL’s current director, said in a statement. “Abe Foxman spoke on the global stage with moral authority and clarity and was relentlessly dedicated to his pursuit of a world without hate.” Born in 1940 to Polish Jews in what’s now Belarus, Foxman survived the Holocaust after a nanny had him baptized as a Catholic to conceal his Jewish identity. He was reunited with his parents after the war and the family moved to New York. After earning a law degree, Foxman joined the ADL as a staff lawyer. He spent his entire 50-year career with the group, becoming a leading national voice against antisemitism and hate. He was named the organization’s national director in 1987. Upon his retirement, Foxman told The Associated Press that he worried that the internet was giving bigots a way to spread their beliefs “not only anonymously but at the speed of light.” The ADL was founded in 1913 with a mandate to fight antisemitism and all bias. But the emphasis differed over time depending on who was in charge and the issues of the day. Foxman faced criticism that the ADL put too many resources into non-Jewish issues. Under him, the organization built a formidable research arm into white supremacists and other extremists