PROTESTS AT RISING ANTI-SEMITISM

Press, Volume XCIX, Issue 29102, 14 January 1960, Page 9

PROTESTS AT RISING ANTI-SEMITISM

Widespread U.S. Outbreak Now Taken Seriously (NZ. Press Association—Copyright) NEW YORK, January 13. Discoveries of more swastikas on the walls of schools and synagogues brought increased demands today for action against the bigots and vandals responsible. The swastika symbol of Nazism and antiSemitism was found yesterday daubed or scrawled in a New York cemetery, on public buildings, cars and homes in Los Angeles, Chicago, St. Louis; Omaha, Nebraska; La Crosse, Winconsin; and Lowell, Indiana. Police at first had discounted the rash of swastikas across the nation as twisted teen-age pranks, probably inspired by similar antiSemitic demonstrations in Western Europe.

Top police and Jewish leaders warned that the ugly anti-Semitic fad could also be an outlet for real religious bigotry. A Germanborn Chicago psychiatrist, who asked that his name be withheld, said: “This is just the way it started in Germany 14 years before Hitler came to power.” The Wisconsin AttorneyGeneral (Mr John Reynolds) ordered the State’s top detectives into the investigation of two swastikas painted on a synagogue at La Crosse, Wisconsin. In Chicago, the leaders of five Jewish organisations called a special meeting to determine whether pranksters or organised anti-Semitists were behind the outburst of swastikas. President Eisenhower said in a telegram to the National Conference of Christians and Jews in New York today that the “virus of bigotry” could not be permitted to “spread one inch.” "For when it becomes rampant it can cause the destruction of freedom and decency everywhere,” said Mr Eisenhower. The Governor of New York (Mr Nelson Rockefeller) sent a telegram to a special emergency meeting of the American Jewish Congress tonight, in which he said: “Every effort must be made to stop such acts of desecration, and apprehend those guilty.” On Staten Island, New York City, about 100 headstones in a Jewish cemetery were defaced with yellow swastikas and German words.

The cemetery contained the graves of many soldiers killed in World War 11, and some of these graves were among those defaced. The swastikas, found on graves over an area of three acres, were mostly about 18 inches high. The German words for “death” and “fatherland” were painted on others. The word “fuhrer” was painted on others. Jewish stars of David on some headstones had been painted over. Sheriff’s deputies at Los Xngeles said vandals broke into the

William Green Elementary School in Lawndale during the weekend, tore up an American flag and scrawled swastikas in a music room. The words, “Down with Americans, hail good Germans,” were written in German on the blackboard. Deputies said teen-age vandals apparently were responsible.

More than 20 representatives of nationality groups and foreign-language publications conferred with the Mayor of New York (Mr Robert Wagner) on the problem today. The Mayor assured them that the city was making every effort to combat the defacing of synagogues and other Jewish buildings.

Last night, about 500 persons attended a special meeting called by the American Jewish Congress in Washington. The president of the congress (Dr. Joachim Prinz) told the gathering that Germany would never be a true democracy until it had rooted out the unique brand of German anti-semitism. Democracy would never be achieved until the German people learnt that prosperity was no substitute for morality and eliminated former Nazis from the Government, he said. Dr. Prinz refused to agree with suggestions that the wave of antiSemitic incidents was mainly due to neurotics and juvenile delinquents.