Benjamin H. Freedman


Benjamin Harrison Freedman was an American businessman, Holocaust denier, and vocal anti-Zionist. Born in a Jewish family, he converted from Judaism to Roman Catholicism. Outside of political activism, Freedman was a partner in a dermatological institute and investor for small businesses.

Biography

Freedman was, from 1925 to 1937, a partner with Samuel D. Leidesdorf in the John H. Woodbury Laboratories, a dermatological institute and a derivative company of the old Woodbury Soap Company. Benjamin H Freedman was listed on the letterhead of the Institute for Arab American Affairs and around 1946, along with his wife, listed as "R M Schoendorf", "sponsored a series of advertisements under the imprint of 'The League for Peace with Justice in Palestine'". In 1946 he sued the American Jewish Committee for libel and the case was thrown out in less than a month.
In 1988, the Institute for Historical Review, an organization known for propagating Holocaust denial, published Robert John's Behind the Balfour Declaration, including a single acknowledgment to Freedman. John wrote that Freedman "gave me copies of materials on the Balfour Declaration, which I might never have found on my own and encouraged my own research."

Activities

He was a financial backer of the author Conde McGinley, publisher of the antisemitic periodical Common Sense. In the 1955 libel trial by Rabbi Joachim Prinz against McGinley, Freedman testified that "he had given Mr. McGinley financial support of 'more than $10,000 but less than $100,000'". Prinz had sued McGinley for calling him a "red rabbi."
At the Henry George School, Benjamin Freedman spoke on "The Genesis of Middle East Tensions". Long John Nebel reported on WNBC that Freedman would discuss anti-Semitism. Freedman was politically active until the mid-1970s when he was well over 85 years old. He died in May 1984 at the age of 94.
, receiving the Service award from the Anti-Communist Federation of Polish Freedom Fighters in Salem, Massachusetts, 1972. Freedman's wife, Rose Schoendorf, depicted at the far left
Freedman opposed the nomination of Anna M. Rosenberg to be United States Assistant Secretary of Defense in 1950. An article in the ADL Bulletin titled The Plot Against Ann Rosenberg attributed the attacks on Rosenberg's loyalty to "professional anti-Semites and lunatic nationalists", including the "Jew-baiting cabal of John Rankin, Benjamin Freedman, and Gerald Smith".
Freedman, an apostate Jew, was well known to the Anti-Defamation League and the American Jewish Committee as an active supporter of the Arab cause in the Middle East. In the course of his erratic and often contradictory testimony before the Senate committee, Freedman revealed the roles played by anti-Semitic agitators and right-wing anticommunists — including Gerald L. K. Smith, Conde McGinley, the "Reverend" Wesley Swift, Congressman John Rankin, Senator Joseph McCarthy, and J. B. Matthews — in the campaign against the Rosenberg appointment.

He is mentioned in a report by the House Un-American Activities Committee.

Works