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Comments (0)A dispute between right-wing and left-wing Israel activists in Berkeley, Calif., resulted in a physical altercation involving pepper spray, police and paramedics.
On Sunday, activists from San Francisco Voice for Israel/StandWithUs disrupted a meeting of Jewish Voice for Peace at the South Berkeley Senior Center, heckling speakers. One StandWithUs activist, Robin Dubner of Oakland, used pepper spray against two Jewish Voice for Peace members. The Jewish Voice for Peace members said the spraying was unprovoked, but Dubner said she sprayed because she was physically attacked.
Berkeley Police and paramedics were called to the scene, but no arrests were made.
More than 50 people were in attendance at an evening meeting featuring as speakers Bay Area residents Rae Abileah and Matthew Taylor, two of the five Jewish Voice for Peace protesters who heckled Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at last week’s General Assembly of the Jewish Federations of North America in New Orleans.
Michael Harris, a leader with San Francisco Voice for Israel/StandWithUs, said the disruption of a Jewish Voice for Peace meeting was something he and his colleagues had never done before, but chose to do so “because they were having this celebration of heckling Netanyahu. Since they decided this was acceptable political discourse, we decided to do the same thing.”
Harris said that he and his nine fellow protesters acted as individuals and not as part of an organized StandWithUs action.
Jewish Voice for Peace is a Berkeley-based national organization that describes itself as a pro-peace group, but which critics say works to undermine the State of Israel. Last month, the Anti-Defamation League included Jewish Voice for Peace on its list of the 10 most influential and active anti-Israel groups in the United States.
Release U.S. Report on Nazis’ Safe Haven, Wiesenthal Center Urges
The Simon Wiesenthal Center has called on President Obama to release a 2006 Justice Department report disclosing that the U.S. government provided a safe haven for Nazi war criminals.
The New York Times on Nov. 12 reported on the 600-page report, posted on the newspaper’s website, which says that the U.S. government provided a safe haven for Nazis and detailed the government’s effort to bring some alleged Nazi war criminals to justice.
“The Simon Wiesenthal Center urges the immediate release of the entire report,” said Rabbis Marvin Hier, founder and dean, and Abraham Cooper, associate dean of the center. “There must be full transparency as to who, how, and why war criminals and Nazi collaborators were protected by our government during the Cold War.
“We urge the President to order Attorney General (Eric) Holder to immediately post the entire report, including any omissions, online along with all official documents related to it. The victims of the Holocaust are owed no less.”
The report examines the work of the Justice Department’s Office of Special Investigations, which was created in 1979 to deport Nazis. More than 300 Nazis have been deported, stripped of citizenship or blocked from entering the United States since the creation of the OSI, according to the report.
The report accuses the CIA of knowingly allowing Nazi war criminals to enter the United States “for postwar intelligence purposes.” The report also said, however, that the number of Nazis who entered the United States after WWII was smaller than the 10,000 figure that is often cited.
The report was commissioned in 1999 by then-Attorney General Janet Reno, and edited by Mark Richard, a senior Justice Department lawyer, in 2006. The department has kept the report under wraps since 2006, only turning it over to the private National Security Archive last month under threat of a lawsuit.
Some legally and diplomatically sensitive sections of the report were omitted before it was turned over, the Times reported, adding that it obtained a complete version.
Joint Congressional Letter Questions Saudi Arms Deal
A joint congressional letter raising concerns and asking questions about a proposed $60 billion arms sale to Saudi Arabia was delivered to Obama administration officials.
The bipartisan letter, signed by 198 U.S. lawmakers, was delivered Nov. 12 to Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and Defense Secretary Robert Gates, Foreign Policy magazine reported.
The letter was coordinated jointly by outgoing House Foreign Affairs Committee chairman Howard Berman (D-Calif.) and incoming chairwoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla.), according to the report.
“We believe that arms transfers, particularly those of this magnitude and involving such sophisticated equipment, require careful Congressional scrutiny and oversight in order to ensure that our national security interests are advanced and our allies are protected,” the letter read.
In the letter, the Congress members ask the administration officials what U.S. policy goals and interests are advanced by the sale and if any conditions have been placed on it, as well as about potential repercussions for U.S. troops and “friends” in the region should there be political change in Saudi Arabia.
Referring specifically to Israel, the letter states, “America has long been committed to Israel’s qualitative military edge (QME)—that is, its ability to prevail against any combination of regional threats. While we understand the administration has worked productively with Israel to address Israeli security concerns, we would like to know how these arms sales will affect Israel’s QME and what steps we have taken, or are planning to take, to maintain and strengthen Israel’s edge.”
Israel reportedly backs the sale, the most expensive arms deal ever, to be spread out over five to 10 years.
The deal includes 84 new F-15 fighter planes, and nearly 200 Apache, Black Hawk and Little Bird helicopters, as well as upgrades for 70 other fighter planes. The deal also would include a satellite-guided “smart bomb” system, as well as anti-ship and anti-radar missiles.
Congress has 30 days to review the deal and could block or amend the sale.