Black American Group Supports Israel’s Policy of Preventing Entry of Black Cult Members

An unofficial group of American black leaders sponsored by “BASIC” (Black Americans to Support Israel Committee) has expressed support of Israel’s policy to prevent additional members of the “Black Hebrew Communty” (BHC) from joining some 1,200 already in the country.

But the group, led by the pro-Israel Black activist, Bayard Rustin, urged the Israel government to cease airport entry procedures that smack of racism, and to come to quick decisions on how to treat the existing BHC people who are in the country, (mainly in Dimona and Arad).

In an interview with the Jerusalem Post today, Rustin said that he himself would defend Israel’s right to deport the members of the cult, and he called the BHC leader, Ben-Ami Carter, a “dictator.”

The group as a whole, however, was careful at an earlier press conference not to pass judgement on Carter and the BHC. It maintained that deportation of the BHC people from Israel now was not a viable or condonable option.

SPENT II DAYS STUDYING THE PROBLEM

The group included, beside Rustin, Alexander Allen, vice president of the National Urban League, Lewis Carter III, national labor director of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, and Mrs. Arthur Logan of the National Council of Negro Women.

It spent II days studying the BHC’s problem, held meetings with Israeli officials, including President Yitzhak Navon, Interior Minister Yosef Burg, Foreign Minister Yitzhak Shamir; the U.S. Embassy staff, including Ambassador Samuel Lewis; Histadrut officials; representatives of the American Jewish Committee, American Jewish Congress and the Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith; newspaper editors; and members of the two main BHC concentrations in Dimona and Arad, as well as local residents in both cities.

FINDS NO OFFICIAL RACISM IN ISRAEL

In its report the group declared it had found “no official racism in Israel.” Rustin and Allen stressed this key conclusion at a press conference here yesterday. But the report added that the practices of immigration police at the airport entry point “risk being perceived as racist no matter what explanations are given.”

Blacks arriving in the country are weeded out of waiting lines and subjected to apparently discriminatory treatment and questioning, the report said. “Such behavior encourages anti-Israel propaganda and creates conflict between American Jews and American Blacks,” it warned.

Rustin revealed that anti-Israel groups in Washington are currently collating the testimonies of Black visitors to Israel telling of such undignified treatment and these affidavits could be used against Israel in the future before the court of American public opinion.

He and his colleagues demanded there fore “extremely impeccable conduct” and “dignity” on the part of immigration officials who go about their unchallengeable duty to prevent illegal entry of undesirable aliens.

The report also urged the Israel government “to make a prompt decision defining the status of these persons.” Long delays had impinged on their human rights, the group felt. Its own recommendations were that the BHC people be given temporary work permits and that efforts to provide them with adequate housing continue.

On the controversial matter of Carter’s power over the BHC, the group merely noted in an “addendum” that “our concern for human rights extends to those which may be denied to the members of BHC by its leader.”

The addendum noted, too, a “recent indication of a spirit of cooperation and compromise” between the BHC and the Israeli authorities, but for the moment the group regarded these indications “with some scepticism.”

The BHC began arriving in the country from Liberia, where it still maintains a large community, over 10 years ago. Carter and others declared then and subsequently that the BHC would eventually take over the country from the Israeli Jews who are not the truly “chosen people.”

Rustin told the press conference that in view of the BHC’s ideology “we can fully appreciate Israel’s anxiety, “and he agreed that an underlying theme of the group’s findings was that Israel is justified in keeping additional BHC members out of the country.