In a very nasty aside for an obituary, Matt Schudel questions the reality of Rosenblatt's memoirs:
Mr. Rosenblatt wrote occasional articles for newspapers, including The Washington Post, and often claimed to be at work on his memoirs, which were never completed, if they exist at all.Rosenblatt's memoirs do exist. In fact, they are cataloged in the Maurice Rosenblatt papers collection, at the Library of Congress, boxes 77-80.
But there is a more significant omission. There is no mention of Rosenblatt's role in the American League for a Free Palestine, founded by Peter Bergson, Samuel Merlin , Ben Hecht, and other supporters of the Irgun. The organization, which evolved from the Committee for a Jewish Army and the Emergency Committee to Rescue the Jewish People of Europe, was instrumental in building American support for Israeli independence (for those too young to remember,Israel is in fact Palestine, and Israelis are the original Palestinians. They were called that until the establishment of the state of Israel, because Palestine was a colonial name). In that capacity, Rosenblatt helped produce Ben Hecht's pageant, produced by Billy Rose, starring Paul Muni and Marlon Brando, A Flag Is Born. The lead character was called "Tevye."
I came to know Rosenblatt through my film, Who Shall Live and Who Shall Die?. Although by 1981 Rosenblatt was a rich and powerful lobbyist, who could have made a great deal of money doing other things, he took time and trouble to arrange a Washington, DC screening in the United States Senate. The event was bi-partisan, sponsored by Senators Claiborne Pell (D-RI)--later chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee (who appeared in the film)--and Rudy Boschwitz (R-MN). He invited newspaper reporters, so the film showing was covered by a Washington correspondent from the New York Times, Bernard Weinraub (later Hollywood bureau chief), and a Style reporter from the Washington Post, Felicity Barringer (now a New York Times Editor) who wrote a biography of Rosenblatt's long-time compantion, Tamara Wall (also not mentioned in the Post).
Later, Rosenblatt became a friend, inviting me to drinks and dinner when he stayed at the Algonquin Hotel in New York, regaling me with stories, and introducing me to Mrs. Walter Bishop, then-head of the United Nations Association, with the idea that I would make a film about Franklin Delano Roosevelt and the New Deal. Maybe I should have done it, but I demurred, since at the age of 25, felt inadequate to the task. He also introduced me to some potential backers for a film about the history of Israel. Again, I backed out. He introduced me to the author Lawrence Leamer, to do a film about Ronald Reagan, sort of Michael Moore type thing. It got as far as drinks with Gore Vidal at the Beverly Hills Hotel.
The point is, no one before or since had been as helpful or supportive to a total stranger. It wasn't because he liked me--it was because he felt very proud of his associaton with Peter Bergson and Ben Hecht. He had defeated Joe McCarthy, but he was prouder still of his work to build the state of Israel, and he liked that I had made a film about a man he had admired, and a cause he admired, trying to save the Jews during WWII and build up a Jewish state afterwards.
That the State of Israel exists today is in some way due to the efforts of Maurice Rosenblatt and the American League for a Free Palestine. That is an accomplishment worth remembering.
