The execution of seven Iraqis–all Moslems–at dawn today for allegedly spying for Israel was angrily denounced by three major American Jewish organizations. Arthur J. Goldberg, president of the American Jewish Committee, called the execution of three Iraqi soldiers by firing squad and four civilians by hanging “an act contrary to all civilized behavior and a direct violation of human rights.” Dr. William A. Wexler, president of B’nai B’rith, said the “continued barbarity” of the Iraqi Government “emphasizes the sorry state of political freedom and human rights” in that country and “also points up that there is no future for the defenseless remnant of a Jewish community trapped there.” Rabbi Arthur J. Lelyveld, American Jewish Congress president, declared, “It does not lessen our outrage at these brutalities that no Jews were included among the latest victims. Whether the victims are Jews, Moslems or Christians, our concern is with the absence of even minimal justice in the secret military trials that condemned them and the degenerate manner in which their bodies were shown to the public.”
Baghdad radio, which announced the executions and reported that the bodies were displayed in the capital’s Liberation Square, said that nine defendants had been condemned for espionage on Feb. 11 by a three-man military tribunal. The death sentence of one was commuted to life imprisonment because he cooperated with authorities and the other was reported to he at large, the radio said. Last Jan. 27, 14 Iraqis–nine of them Jews–were hanged in Baghdad and Basra on the same charges and their bodies were publicly displayed.
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