Jdlers Sentenced in Israel for Extortion; Kahane Draws Suspended Sentence in N.Y.

An American and a Canadian student at Bar Ilan University who admitted to membership in the Jewish Defense League, were sentenced to six months in jail by a Tel Aviv district court today on charges of having extorted money from fellow students for the JDL. The accused, Robert Fine, 25, an American and Seymour Laker, 23, of Canada, denied the charges. (Federal Judge Jack B. Weinstein imposed a five year suspended sentence and $6000, fine on JDL national chairman Rabbi Meir Kahane in U.S. District Court in Brooklyn Thursday. Kahane was convicted of making bombs at the JDL’s Camp Jedel in Woodburne, N.Y. Two co-defendants, Chaim Bieber and Stewart Cohen. were given three year suspended sentences and three years’ probation. Bieber was fined $2500, and Cohen $500. More than 200 JDL followers cheered the verdict and carried Kahane out of the courthouse on their shoulders. In rendering his verdict, Judge Weinstein said, “In this country at this time it is not permissible to substitute the bomb for the book as a symbol of Jewish manhood,” He said that if the terms of probation are violated the suspended sentences would be revoked and the full jail terms imposed on Kahane and the others. Kahane said later that he had not asked the court for leniency. He insisted that there were times when “there is no other way than violence.” He said the JDL would buy rifles for Jewish “self defense” and announced that its new motto would be. “Every Jew a, 22.”)