Representatives of leading American Jewish organizations indicated today that the disclosure that two organizations the Rev. Jesse Jackson is affiliated with had received contributions totallina $200,000 from the Arab League may further alienate Jewish voters from Jackson’s Democratic Presidential campaign.
“A man is known by the company he keeps,” said Julius Berman, the chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations. “And a condidate is known by those who are numbered among his major supporters.”
Rabbi Alexander Schindler, president of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations, said,”I believe that many American Jews, already worried about Jesse Jackson’s links with the Arab world, will now feel increased concern over his Presidential candidacy.”
Alleck Resnick, president of the Zionist Organization of America, described as “double speak” Jackson’s reported statement regarding the “double standard” which he claimed existed in evaluating contributions to his group from the Arab League and contributions from American Jews to a political candidate.
Questions concerning contributions to PUSH, the umbrella organization containing five civil rights groups, were raised on Sunday. Yesterday, an attorney representing PUSH, an acronym for People United to Serve Humanity, confirmed that the Arab League had contributed $100,000 each to PUSH for Excellence, Inc., an educational arm of PUSH, and the PUSH Foundation, a fund-raising group for PUSH affiliates.
CITES ‘HUMANITARIAN CONTRIBUTION’
The contributions to the two organizations were made in 1981-1982 when Jackson was head of Push for Excellence, Inc. Clovis Maksoud, the permanent observer for the Arab League at the United Nations, said yesterday that the two checks for $100,000 each were sent as a “humanitarian contribution.”
The PUSH Foundation, with which Jackson has no formal connection, is a non-profit tax exempt organization which makes grants to worthy causes, including PUSH for ExceIlence. Jackson contended that it is legal for a charity to accept foreign contributions. The Internal Revenue Service supports that position. Maksoud said the Arab League had checked with the Justice Department to make certain that such a contribution did not violate U.S. law.
CRITICIZES MEDIA REPORTS
Jackson’s attorney, John Bustamante of Cleveland, who represents PUSH organizations, told a news conference yesterday that the contributions were solicited as part of a broad fund-raising effort from “all ambassadors” listed in the “diplomatic blue book.”
Jackson has maintained he had no knowledge of the contributions to the PUSH Foundation or PUSH for Excellence. He was quoted as saying he would again accept a similar donation “if it’s legal and there’s no bind and there’s no understanding or obligation and it’s given for stated purposes.”
Bustamante criticized media reports about the contribution, saying they were part of “an ongoing attempt to influence the public to view gifts from Arab sources as somehow more different and more questionable from other sources.” Jackson took a 1 leave of absence from his position as head of PUSH for Excellence while he seeks the Democratic Presidential nomination.
In 1979, Jackson accepted a donation for PUSH from the Libyan government for $10,000. Yesterday, Bustamante acknowledged that the PUSH Foundation had also received an anonymous donation of $350,000 which he said originated through a wire transfer to the Foundation. Bustamante said he did not know the date of the anonymous donation.
Jackson has come under fire from Jewish groups in the past, most notably for his public embrace of PLO chief Yasir Arafat during a trip by Jackson to the Middle East several years ago, and for a series of statements attributed to him critical of Zionism and a statement that he was sick and tired of hearing about the Holocaust.
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.
