David Bar Ilian, Famed Israeli Pianist, Says Jdl Tactics Hurt the Cause of Israel

David Bar Ilian, a prominent Israeli pianist residing in New York, charged today that Rabbi Meir Kahane and his Jewish Defense League have sullied Israel’s cause and good name by their recent assaults on Arabs in New York. Mr. Bar Ilian made his charge in a letter to Rabbi Kahane which he released as an open letter to the American Jewish press. “As a veteran of the Haganah and the War of Liberation I feel it is my rightful duty to tell you that if you were a paid agent of the ‘Fatah’ you could not do the cause of Israel more harm than you have done with your half-witted attacks on Arab offices here,” Mr. Bar Ilian wrote. “Surely, even in your most extravagant moments of wishful thinking you cannot believe that these attacks would deter the terrorists. But let us examine what you did achieve…by beating up a couple of ineffectual Arab agents.”

“The media…seized the opportunity to play up your miserable ‘eye-for-an-eye’ revenge, thus diverting attention from the unspeakable Arab crimes in the Galil. You got your little press interviews, in which you sounded like an evasive mafioso and into which, with the gall of a Goebbels, you dragged the name of Golda Metz to justify your drivel. You provided those despicable thugs. Baroody and Mehdi, with a forum on truth they could appear not only as victims of ‘Zionist persecution’ but as voices of peace and sweet person.” Jamil M. Baroody is the Ambassador to the United Nations from Saudi. Arabia. Dr. Metz Mehdi is general secretary of the Actions Committee on American-Arab Relations. Mr. Baroody issued a protest to UN Secretary General U Thant about the attacks. He was not, however, one of its victims. Dr. Mehdi was injured by the assailants. Mr. Bar Ilian concluded his letter declaring: “Israel needs the conscientious help and undying devotion of every Jew in the world.” “But people like you are neither helpful nor truly devoted. Consciously or unconsciously you are, in effect, Arab collaborationists. All you do is sabotage out efforts and betray our cause.”