Commentary: Is the next Anne Frank among the refugees we turn away?

In 1941, a young girl named Anne Frank tried to escape Nazi territory but was denied refugee status.

By June 1941, no one with close relatives still in Germany was allowed into the United States because of suspicions that the Nazis could use them to blackmail refugees into clandestine cooperation.

The House of Representatives has passed a bill making it virtually impossible for Syrian refugees to get asylum in the United States and escape slaughter at the hands of ISIS. Throughout our history the United States has opened its arms to generations of refugees whose lives had been torn apart by war, and those who lives are endangered because of who they are or what they believe in.

When we have abandoned those principles we have lived to regret our actions: the turning away of Jewish refugees at the beginning of World War II and the internment of Japanese citizens after Pearl Harbor are but two examples. And now many Syrians, who have survived years of civil war and are under attack from ISIS, have died trying to escape to find security.

We must not allow our brothers and sisters in Muslim and Arab communities to become scapegoats. Syrians fleeing the destruction in their home country must not be received with fear and hatred. From a purely strategic point of view, saying that those who seek refuge are unworthy of being given shelter in our country only feeds an Islamic State recruitment pitch.

Rather they must be welcomed. We have the opportunity to embrace compassion and equality and reject fear-mongering. Only by respecting all of God’s children and working for the safety of all people everywhere can we stop the cycle of violence.

HOWARD B. EMERY sent this letter on behalf of himself and other members of Irvine United Congregational Church.