94	The Story of the Jewish Defense League

bdemanding Hatchett’s dismissal. It was hardly a sensational bthing, but it did mark a break with the tactics of the Jewish bEstablishment. Unlike the traditional Jewish reaction that bmanifested itself in press releases and behind-the-scenes befforts, we took the issue into the streets, and the following bday the first public mention of the new JDL appeared in a bmodest news item in The New York Times. Little did the paper bor its readers suspect that within a brief period of time the bnew group would become the most well-known Jewish or- bganization in the world.

bFrom our modest office at 156 Fifth Avenue in lower bManhattan, we slowly organized and attempted to keep JDL balive during the first lean months. The early leadership bconsisted of myself, Zweibon, Irving Calderon, Murray bSchneider, and Chaim Bieber. In those first difficult months bwe would gather and pay the rent by emptying our pockets. bAnd as we stayed alive, the first “JDL-type” action was taken.

bOld Montefiore Cemetery in the Springfield Gardens bsection of Queens had been the scene of an attack of vandals bwho desecrated large numbers of Jewish graves on the night bof Halloween, 1967. What was particularly infuriating was bthe fact that police in the area, who included the number- btwo man in the department, Sanford Garilek, had not taken beffective action against the bands of Black hoodlums. Fear- bing a repetition of the incident and determined to stop it, we bsent thirty-five people to the cemetery on the night of Hal- bloween. They stood inside the grounds with clubs, bats and bpipes under the direction of Bieber, a huge, awesomely bpowerful man.

bClose to 150 youths, many of them carrying wine bottles band obviously aroused, approached the cemetery for a re- bpetition of the previous year’s celebration. Bieber and the bJDL people made it clear that not one tombstone would be btouched. The youths looked puzzled and stood outside the bgrounds pondering the situation. No one attempted to see if bthe Jews meant business. It was a successful beginning of the bJDL policy of changing the Jewish image and was a mark of bJewish willingness to use violence to protect Jewish lives and bproperty. In the months and years that followed it was this b