An attempt to halt the performance last night of the Ukrainian Dance Company at the Lincoln Center by two young Brooklyn Jewish activists, who threw plastic bags filled with animal blood on the stage, failed when plain-clothes detectives rushed the two out of the building, police reported today. The stage was splattered with blood but any other plans the activists had to stop the performance were foiled when they were ejected and arrested.
Avran Malek, 21, and Josepf Klein, 19, ran down the aisles 15 minutes after the Russian dance troupe began its regular performance and threw the blood-filled bags on stage. Some of the bags burst on impact but the dancers finished their number. The company began a two-week run here on July 24 while 40 members of the National Conference for Soviet Jewry and the Student Struggle for Soviet Jewry demonstrated outside the building.
Shortly after the arrests, a woman called a New York newspaper and read a statement which said “we have just received word that the condition of Silva Zalmanson and Raiza Palatnik.” two Jewish women activists now in Soviet Jails, “has alarmingly deteriorated in recent days.” The message also said “Soviet culture will not be allowed in New York while Soviet Jews languish in concentration camps” and “Silva and Raiza die of starvation and disease.” The two youths spent the night in a city jail and were released today on low bail. No date was set for their trial on charges of possessing noxious material and resisting arrest.
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.
