Jewish resolve on civil rights issues has been “mitigated” by the activities of extremist factions in the Negro community, Rabbi Jay Kaufman, executive vice-president of B’nai B’rith, said at a reception given by the order in honor of Mayor Walter E. Washington and other members of the District of Columbia administration. Mayor Washington is a Negro.
“The anti-Israel position taken by SNCC (Student non-Violent Coordinating Committee) and by the New Left conference in Chicago last year has created confusion in the minds of Jews who had supported. the goals of the Negro revolution,” Rabbi Kaufman said. “I think that Jews were singularly free of the corrosion of the white backlash until then,” he said, “but they are no longer and must be brought back to their former resolve and fervor.”
Mayor Washington told the 200 guests at the reception that he accepted Rabbi Kaufman’s challenge and called for a coalition of business, religious and civic leaders of the District “to help bring about the kind of town where we can live in peace and dignity.” He warned, however that “if we develop the attitudes of negativism and defeatism, we may as well not make the effort.”
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