American Jewish organizations this week-end took steps to try to save the lives of two Iraqi Jewish youths condemned to death by Iraqi courts on charges of having bombed the American Information Center in Baghdad and a synagogue in the same city.
The American Jewish Committee announced that its representatives had discussed the trial of the two youths with the State Department. The Committee pointed out that the conviction of the youths was based on a “confession” wrung from one of them by torture and later repudiated by him in open court. It also listed a number of other irregularities involved in the trial.
The American Jewish Congress last night appealed to Prince Abdul Illah, Regent of Iraq, to stay the execution. In a message to the Regent, Dr. Israel Goldstein, president of the Congress, pointed out that the reported confirmation of the death sentences by the Iraqi Supreme Court had “caused grave anxiety here.”
(In London, meanwhile, the World Jewish Congress has submitted additional documentation concerning the Baghdad trial to the British Foreign Office. A.L. Eastman, political director of the W.J.C., voiced the hope that the British Government would find it possible to prevent the carrying out of the executions.)
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