Jews appeal to Kremlin

Press, Volume CXI, Issue 32542, 27 February 1971, Page 17

Jews appeal to Kremlin

(N.Z.P.A.-Reuter —Copyright) BRUSSELS, Feb. 26. The 700 delegates to the world congress in Brussels on Soviet Union Jews returned home today after three days of debate marked by bitter disagreements. But the moderates and the activists sank their differences in the closing hours of

the conference to give their backing to an appeal to Mos- ’ cow to give more rights to 1 i Russian Jews, especially to I . emigrate if they wish. < The conference, during 1 1 which there had been scuf- ■ fles and slanging matches be- ’ tween the delegates, ended . on a quieter note than expected. After a British peer, Lord i , Janner, had appealed to the ' assembly not to give the j t world reason to think that they were divided by their slight differences, the "Brussels Appeal” was read out, and nobody raised an objection. Observers say the reason for this may well have been the result of many speakers begging the congress to realise that the point of the meet- I ing was to emphasise their I solidarity with Russian Jews | —“to show them they are not alone.”

Another strong unifying influence was a brief speech last night by the former Israeli Prime Minister, Mr David Ben Gurion, aged 85. The highlight of the congress came on Wednesday, when the militant leader Rabbi Meir Kahane, who had flown to Brussels from New York, was arrested by the Belgian police and expelled the same evening as "a possible source of trouble.”

The arrest of the rabbi, whose Jewish Defence League has organised the harassment of Soviet Union diplomats and attacks on Russian property in New

York, was the main focus of attention during the greater part of the conference. The organisers* refusal to allow him to participate in the conference, on the ground that his organisation preached violence, gave rise to further trouble.

The American film producer, Otto Preminger, told the conference that the organisers, “by putting him

, down and shutting him up,” : had reacted in the same con- > temptible way as the Nazis i and the Russian secret police, i A few minutes later—after ' the uproar in the hall had made his speech inaudible— Mr Preminger apologised for his comparison. He said that while he completely disapproved of the tactics of the Jewish Defence League, they had a right to be heard, and if they behaved badly they should then be thrown out. A former Israeli Cabinet Minister was loudly applauded by a number of delegates when he called for “a month of fighting on behalf of Soviet Jewry all over the world.”