The Jewish community of Milan is requesting the status of plaintiff in the upcoming trial of four suspected terrorists accused of detonating a bomb at the entrance to the Jewish Community Center at Via Eupili 8 in Milan on the night of September 29-30. The bombing occurred just nine days before a machinegun and grenade attack on worshippers outside the main synagogue in Rome in which two lives were last.
Milan police arrested 14 suspects in the community center bombing. The four to go on trial were directly responsible for the act, according to the police. All were identified as members of the “Communists Organized for Proletarian Liberation” (COLP), a group linked to several extreme leftwing organizations and suspected of subversion.
The organizations are “Prima Linea,” “Autonomia Operaia Organizzata,” and “Nuclei Combattenti Communisti.” They are believed to work in tandem with the Palestine Liberation Organization for the purpose of creating panic among Jews, civil chaos and undermining faith in Western democ- racy, a spokesman for the Rome Jewish community told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
According to the spokesman, “The startling element of these arrests (in Milan) is that this is the first time that an anti-Jewish attempt in Italy turns out to have been organized by an extra-parliamentary leftist group with international connections. There are no precedents here for this and no relations can be drawn with other previous demonstrative anti-Jewish acts.”
He added, “The known relationships between Palestinian terrorist groups and extra-parliamentary Italian terrorism leads logically to the supposition that there are reciprocal interests between the two.”
The four suspects to face trial are: Cesare Bonetti, Graziano Bianchi and Claudio Cordini, all law students in Milan and in their early 20s; and Claudio La Monica, 23, a student of architecture born in Sardinia but living in Milan.
The other 10 suspects are expected to stand trial at later dates for alleged subversive activities and robbery.
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