A Tragedy -- Red Cross Double Cross
 
By Lawrence S. Eagleburger
 
Tuesday, October 30, 2001; The Washington Post. Page A21
 
Dr. Bernadine Healy's resignation as president of the American 
Red Cross is a tragedy. This remarkable woman has, in less than 
two years, forced major reforms on a reluctant governing body and 
shown superb crisis management skills in the aftermath of the 
terrible events of Sept. 11.
 
But this is not all she should be remembered for. Healy, shortly 
after she took office, discovered that the American Red  Cross had
acquiesced for decades in the policy of the International Federation
of the Red Cross and Red Crescent to oppose accepting Magen
David Adom as a legitimate emblem of the Israeli  equivalent of the
Red Cross. She rightly  saw this as, at best, turning a blind eye on
a moral wrong; in an act of  great moral courage, she set about to
put things  right. She spoke against the federation's anti-Israeli
stance in Geneva, the home of the federation, and stirred up a
hornet's nest of denials of wrongdoing, complaints against her
lack of  diplomatic finesse and charges that her methods  just
"weren't done" in Geneva.

When it became obvious that the federation (and most of its
member states)  were not going to change their ways, Healy
settled in for a long and sometimes nasty battle. She made it
clear to the  federation and her own board that the  American
Red Cross was no longer prepared to accept in silence a
policy that  was inimical to our deepest held values  and that
put the lie to the federation's claims of universality.

As a part of Healy's preparations for a strategic approach
to the fight to  force the federation to forswear its
discriminatory policy against Israel, she asked me to
accept appointment as ambassador at large (a high sounding
but  unpaid and powerless position), and to advise her
when she felt the need for  advice. I accepted, went several
times to  Geneva on her behalf and saw at firsthand the
conspiracy of silence and  obfuscation deployed against
the American Red Cross's efforts to at least get the issue
thoroughly aired before members of  the federation
and the public.

I suggested to Healy that withholding dues to the federation
was a useful way to force the federation to take the  American
Red Cross's demands seriously; Healy agreed, and the funds
were  withheld, with the approval of the board.  At the time,
I warned Healy that support for this aggressive policy would
begin to diminish over time as the weak of  heart, and those
who really did not care much if the discrimination against
Israel continued, listened to the blandishments of the
federation's bureaucrats and politicians, who would argue
that a  hard-line American approach would never
accomplish its objective, while compromise and goodwill
could eventually  accomplish much.

I recently sent Healy a memorandum that laid out the
issues as I saw them:

"The refusal of the International Federation of the Red Cross
and Red  Crescent to reverse its long-standing opposition
to accepting Magen David Adom as a legitimate emblem
of the Israeli Red  Cross equivalent is, and has been from
the  inception of this exclusionary policy, immoral. As such
it has no place in  an organization which purports to be
philanthropic in its purposes, and caring for the least
of us in its  practices.

"That the exclusion of Magen David Adom has continued
for decades without  strong objection from the American
Red  Cross has raised legitimate questions about our
commitment to the fundamentals of the Red Cross
movement, and to the  principles that guide American
foreign policy. It is for those reasons that  I recommended
that the American Red Cross  withhold its dues from the
Federation. We have no business supporting an  immoral
policy that looks and smells too  much like the infamous
policies of the 1930's and 1940's. . . .

"As certain as night follows day we can expect that
bureaucrats from the  Federation will do all they can
to persuade  leading Americans to force President Healy
. . . to return to discredited policies.

"They must not succeed! At a time when the United States
and the civilized  world are at war with extremism, it
would  be an inexcusable mistake for a leading humanitarian
organization like the  American Red Cross to succumb
to political  pressure and drop its principled opposition to
policies of exclusion and  intolerance."

But "they" have succeeded. Last week Healy was forced
out of office by a behind-closed-doors vote of the
American  Red Cross's Board of Governors -- not because
of anything relating to the  Sept. 11 tragedy but because
she dared to  try to right a wrong -- the wrong of
denying a sovereign nation equality  because of its ethnicity.
The weak and easily  persuaded had indeed succumbed to
the blandishments of the sophisticated  federation apologists
who are so adept at making a wolf look like a sheep.
Before long the American Red Cross, under  its new
and surely more "moderate"  leadership, will return to
paying its dues and "cooling it" on the issue of
granting Magen David Adom the equality justice  demands.

Those of us who, like Healy, believe that the American
Red Cross  must represent the best of our nation have
lost not just a battle but a war.

The writer is a former secretary of state.
© 2001 The Washington Post Company