LETTERS NASSAU AND SUFFOLK Edition

Irving Grossman is the latest of your readers to attack Sheryl McCarthy for one of her thoughtful columns, this one being "With This New War, Profound Changes Are in Store" [Viewpoints, Oct. 8]. McCarthy is not afraid to go against the prevailing hysteria and the calls for revenge which ha...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inNewsday
Main Authors Vieser, David, Brancati, J P, Hanni and David Oppenheimer, Lynch, William F, Hughes, Linda, Rattner, Bob, Stevens, Arlene D, MacElveen, Mary, Tennenbaum, Silvia, Puttre, Peter, Napoli, Gus
Format Newspaper Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Long Island, N.Y Newsday LLC 31.10.2001
EditionCombined editions
Subjects
Grossman, Irving
McCarthy, Sheryl
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Summary:Irving Grossman is the latest of your readers to attack Sheryl McCarthy for one of her thoughtful columns, this one being "With This New War, Profound Changes Are in Store" [Viewpoints, Oct. 8]. McCarthy is not afraid to go against the prevailing hysteria and the calls for revenge which have filled your letters page since that dreadful day in September that changed our lives so profoundly and forever. But Grossman should rely less on contemporary propaganda and more on the facts of history in his tirade. It is simply not true that Islam "has never tolerated any other religion in its area." Islam was far more tolerant than Christianity in the years when it ruled a large portion of the Mediterranean. The flowering of Judaism in Spain, its Golden Age, occurred under Muslim rule, and it was the Christians who drove the Jews from Spain in 1492. It was Christianity that spread terror across Europe and the Holy Land during the Crusades and Christianity which instituted the Inquisition that wrought havoc in Catholic Europe for several hundred years. Jews and those whom the Christians considered "pagans" have traditionally suffered more grievously under their rule than under Islam.