130	The Story of the Jewish Defense League

battention in humid 90-degree weather. For two hours, the bthirty-four teenagers (the rest were on work duty) had been bpunching, kicking, parrying—practicing karate, ‘the art of bkilling.’

b“A young instructor walked down the lines, kicking about bevery fourth lad hard in the solar plexus. Each doubled over bmomentarily and looked as though he might vomit; then he bstraightened up proudly. Three weeks of five-hour daily bkarate lessons had toughened the young men.

b“Most of the teenagers at camp here fire weapons and blearn the refinements of hand-to-hand combat for the first btime and not for the sport of it. They come from some of the bmeanest sections of New York City. When this eight-week bcamp is over they will go back to those same streets.

b“They are Jews. They are going through the gruelling bpunishment at the camp because they believe Jews in the bUnited States are fighting for survival. Their organization, bthe Jewish Defense League, promises that the Jew will no blonger play the patsy.”

bThey were tough youngsters by the end of the season. At bthe Catskill Mountain retreat, surrounded on all sides by bother Jewish camps where “nice” Jewish children did what bnice Jewish parents enjoyed seeing them do, riding horses, bswimming, canoeing, having fun, and playing games, our bJews learned about who they were and how to stay that way band how to tell the gentile, “Never Again.” The camp and bthe Shori Dojo Karate School which we operated in New bYork City were meant to, and did, produce different Jews bwho could take and give, not simply take. We were fortunate bto have as a top karate teacher a former Yeshiva student who bhad himself learned karate because of the daily beatings bfrom anti-Semites he had suffered while in the yeshiva. Alex bSternberg was not only a fine karate expert but also an bexcellent teacher.

bAnd guns. How the Jew reacts negatively to the word! bHow many mothers have told how many Jewish children bthat only goyim have guns. How many Jews in Europe did bnot have guns and did not know how to use them and wished bso much at the end that they did. My views on the question of b