| Wherever There Is Jewish Pain |
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basked U-Thant to confer with U.S. Ambassador Charles
bYost to see what “adequate measures” should be taken.
bFBI agents visited me at our office and asked me if I had
bsent the telegrams. I told them to see my lawyer. That
bSaturday night, more than three thousand people turned
bout for a rally at the United Nations, at which I and Con-
bgressman Mario Biaggi of New York blasted Arab terror. It
bis to Biaggi’s credit that he was the first Congressman to take
bpart in a JDL function—despite the objections of his Jewish
badvisors—and he has proven to be a consistently good
bfriend of the Jews and a hardheaded, logical politician. We
bmarched through Manhattan that evening from Arab mis-
bsion to Arab mission, where I read over a bullhorn the text
bof the telegram to them.
bIn May 1970, Arab guerillas near the Lebanese border
battacked a school bus and murdered eight young Jewish
bschoolchildren. Two Arab offices in New York, one a front
bfor the terrorists and the other the office of chief Arab
blobbyist M. T. Mehdi, were attacked and the occupants
bsavagely beaten. On the night of October 6, following re-
bports that seven Arab terrorists who had hijacked planes
bwould be released by blackmailed European governments, a
bbomb ripped through the offices of the Palestine Liberation
bMovement office in Manhattan. Jewish militants were ac-
btive.
bIn less than three years of existence the JDL had become
bthe most well-known Jewish group in the United States, and
bstories about it were written in every major publication while
bhardly a week went by without mention of it in the press.
bAnd to the dismay of the Jewish Establishment, every ap-
bpearance of mine or of another JDL speaker produced
bastoundingly positive results as Jews were able to hear for
bthemselves the JDL philosophy and were astonished to see a
btotally different picture than the one they had been given by
btheir Jewish groups and the news media.
bInvitations for me to speak came from all over the coun-
btry, and everywhere I spoke to packed halls. On my first trip
bto California the reaction was truly incredible. In April 1971
b