The parade wound its way up Fifth Avenue. Bursting with pride, I marched alongside my friends
and with thousands of others. My friends and I were members of the Jewish Defense League, a
self-defense group, organized by Rabbi Meir Kahane, to counter the mounting anti-Jewish
incidents cropping up in Jewish neighborhoods in New York.
We were mostly in our late teens, children of Holocaust survivors, dedicated to the
“Never Again” slogan. During the previous year, we had gone into troubled neighborhoods to
confront thugs who had attacked older, defenseless Jews—many of whom were, like our parents,
Holocaust survivors.
But on that day, on June 1 st 1969, a brilliantly sunny day, we were enjoying the applause
and acknowledgment from the crowd as we marched by. The Annual Israel Day Parade
organized only a few short years before, brought together close to a million spectators and tens of
thousands of marchers. This event had been organized to celebrate Israel’s creation and was the
pride of the New York-based Jewish community. Marching bands provided a lively, carnival-like
atmosphere, with loud music belting out tune after tune.
That year’s event was inspiring, as it came a year after Israel’s stunning and lightning
victory in defeating several larger, more militarily equipped Arab States who had converged for
the third time in twenty years to destroy the Jewish State.
“Today is gonna be fun,” I thought.
The parade was inching forward. We marched a little and then stopped before marching a
little more. At this pace, it would take several hours to complete the entire route, which consisted
of only about twenty-five blocks.
The JDL was controversial. Many in the Jewish community criticized us as vigilantes and
condemned our methods. But, in reality, we were only answering the call of those Jews who had
been threatened and attacked and who had no one else to turn to for protection.
“If not us, who will protect them?” we asked.
No mainstream organization was ready to lift a finger to help the impoverished Jews
living in crime-ridden enclaves in Brooklyn.
So, for us, it was a ray of sunshine to parade in front of the New York Jewish community
and listen to the genuine and grateful applause as we passed.
As we marched under the bright and cloudless sky, several blocks ahead, I saw a crowd
on the sidewalk, carrying signs and placards and waving black, white, and red flags. We were
still too far to make out who they were and what they were doing. Being that we were still
inching forward, we continued marching happily, enjoying the moment.
Soon, we were near enough to recognize the flags and read the signs from a few of blocks
away. Much to our shock and horror, they were waving Nazi flags with large swastikas, and the
placards they were holding featured images of Adolf Hitler. What’s more, both the men and
women in the crowd were dressed in Nazi uniforms, wearing armbands with swastikas.
Disoriented and horrified, I felt as if I’d gone back in time to Nazi Germany, marching on
the streets of 1940’s Berlin. The scene sank in, and the reality of it sickened me. My friends and I
exchanged looks of disbelief, as we inched closer.
We were all of the same mind: Was it possible that those who advocated for the
destruction of the Jewish people and whose defeat we were celebrating would dare to confront a
million Jews gathered together?
As we got closer we could read the signs: “Gas all Jews” and “Hitler didn’t kill enough
Jews.”
I felt the blood rush to my face, and my heart beat so rapidly I could feel it pulsing in my
neck. Who could have dreamed we would see such signs at the Israel Day Parade?
We continued to march as the silent anger was building in my gut.
By now we were only about a block away. We would be there any minute. What would
we do? And then we were there, alongside the Nazis, and suddenly and without any discussion,
we all knew just what to do.
We broke out of the marching ranks and swarmed the group of haters, jumping on them
and beating them down. The sudden onslaught caught the Nazis by surprise as well as the dozen
or so of New York’s finest who had been detailed to guard them. Our quick succession of kicks
and punches landed with force. All hell broke loose. Crowds of spectators surged forward to
witness the incident, ending the march in the immediate area.
We grabbed their signs and broke them over their heads, knocking Nazis to the ground
one after another. When the cops recovered their composure, they began to grab some of our
boys to make arrests. Some of the Nazis were also recovering from their initial shock, slowly
getting to their feet, only to be kicked and punched down again.
As the cops regained control, those of us who could, slipped away. Some of my friends,
however, were nabbed and arrested.
The Salute to Israel Parade was covered by most of the New York media. Cameramen
nearby began to click away while some filmed the spectacle. The evening news now had a
sensational hot story to report that enlivened the otherwise ho-hum Parade story.
As for the JDL, we got a million dollars of timely publicity announcing to the New York
Jewish community, “Here we are!” As a relative newcomer to the scene, JDL welcomed this
publicity in the evening news stories with the accompanying photos. As much as the established
groups condemned our “hooligan” activities, the everyday Jews nodded in approval. Support
streamed in the days and weeks after the parade.
In subsequent years, we participated in many more Israel Day Parades (against the wishes of the
parade organizers as well as the NYPD). But after that initial year, hundreds of cops boxed us in
on all sides as we marched and hundreds more protected the handful of Nazi protestors.
We quickly learned to alter our tactics. Why get arrested?
We learned where their headquarters was and we waited there for them to come back.
Were we naïve enough to think that our activity would get them to love Jews Of course
not. We simply wanted to let them know that freedom of expression did not include demanding
the death of all Jews. We certainly would not allow it.
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