Forty young Jews marked Israel’s Independence Day yesterday by demonstrating for two hours in front of the immigration and Naturalization Service’s New York Office demanding the deportation from the U.S. of Nazis who murdered Jews and other innocent civilians during World War 11. Yesterday was also the 31st anniversary of the liberation of the Nazi death camps by allied troops.
Ten of the demonstrators handcuffed themselves together in a sit down demonstration in front of the INS building as three others met inside with INS officials. The demonstrators. members of Concerned Jewish Youth. Betar, Student Struggle for Soviet Jewry and Survivors of the Riga Ghetto. charged that the INS "has deliberately stalled the investigation of about 100 Nazi criminals although there is enough evidence to deport many of them."
The protesters carried signs, including "Maikovskis Murdered 15,000–Deport Nazi Criminals." This referred to former SS captain Boleslavs Maikovskis who now lives in Mineola, Long Island. Cantor Lazar Wax. a survivor of Auschwitz, chanted El Mole Rachamim, the Jewish memorial prayer, as six memorial candles were lit. Rabbi Avraham Weiss of the Hebrew Institute of Riverdale read off a list of Nazi death camps. After each one, the demonstrators chanted "Zachor"–Remember.
Police, who at first had maintained that no responsible INS official was available for discussion, finally permitted Weiss. Wax and Wayne Perlmutter of the CJY into the building to speak with INS deputy director Henry Wagner and investigators Frank Zutty and John Weiss. Most of the discussion focussed on Maikovskis. The INS officials maintained that there was not enough evidence to deport him.
JTA has documented Jewish history in real-time for over a century. Keep our journalism strong by joining us in supporting independent, award-winning reporting.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
