Cleaver Attacks Arthur Goldberg As ‘tool of Power Structure’

Former Supreme Court Justice Arthur Goldberg was assailed today by Eldridge Cleaver, former information minister of the Black Panther Party, as “a well known Zionist” investigating “a group that is a threat to both Uncle Toms and Zionists,” according to a report in the Washington Post. Cleaver, in exile in Algiers, attacked Goldberg and black leaders in the United States who set up an unofficial citizens commission of inquiry to investigate recent clashes between police and Panthers.

In a dispatch by Jesse W. Lewis, Jr. from Algiers, Cleaver was quoted as saying that the American power structure is trying to take control of the situation by using a well known Zionist appointing Uncle Tom congressmen like (Democrat Charles) Diggs and (Michigan Democrat John) Conyers and two well known and discredited Uncle Toms like Roy Wilkins and Whitney Young to erect a facade of concerned and official responsibility.”

Wilkins is executive director of the National Association For The Advancement of Colored People, and Young is executive director of the Urban League.

Cleaver, who fled this country late in 1968 to Cuba, has been living in Algiers for the past six months. During his residence here, the Black Panther leader has identified himself and his party with a number of left wing causes. On December 28, at the First International Congress of Committees of Support for Palestine in Algiers, Cleaver shared the speakers’ platform with Arab guerrilla leader Yassar Arafat and attacked “American Zionism.”