Officers of the Executive Protective Service, the special White House unit assigned to shield foreign diplomats from illegal demonstrations and physical harm, tore up placards carried by a group of rabbis today outside the Soviet Embassy. The 35 rabbis were making their second circling of the block, protesting the trials of Soviet Jews, when an EPS sergeant read a mimeographed statement warning them to cease demonstrating within 500 feet of the Embassy. The rabbis nevertheless raised their signs and continued their march, and “the EPS police literally ran after them and grabbed the placards from their hands and tore them up,” it was reported to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency by Samuel H. Sislen, assistant community relations director of the Jewish Community Council of Greater Washington. Sislen said the officers outnumbered the rabbis. There were no arrests. The demonstration was sponsored by the Washington Board of Rabbis, the Rabbinical Assembly of Washington, the Rabbinical. Council and the JCC. The rabbis representing all three branches of Judaism–proceeded to a nearby rally by more than 400 students of the Hebrew Academy. Three high school students were charged with delinquency today after parading in front of the Soviet Embassy bearing an Israeli flag. They were Reed Shneider, Martin. Kramer and Andre Weitzman. In Superior Court today, charges were dropped against David J. Fitzmaurice, secretary general of the International Union of Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers, who had flown an Israeli flag atop the union building, within 500 feet of the Soviet Embassy, last Dec. 30.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
