Vernon E. Jordan Jr., president of the National Urban League, yesterday denounced Black leaders who have voiced support of the Palestine Liberation Organization and declared that Black-Jewish relations should not be endangered by “ill-considered flirtation with terrorist groups devoted to the extermination of Israel.”
Milton Firestone, editor of the Kansas City Jewish Chronicle, reported that Jordan told some 1000 persons at the 65th annual meeting of the National Conference of Catholic Charities in Kansas City, Mo., “It is time to stop providing joy to the cross-burners and the bomb throwers. Indeed, it is time to strengthen the traditional fruitful alliance between the Black community and the Jewish community.”
Jordan, who spoke shortly before President Carter addressed the same group, was applauded at least 15 times during his 30-minute talk, Firestone said.
The Urban League president did not mention any Black leader by name. But sources close to Jordan said he was referring to the recent meetings with PLO leader Yasir Arafat by the Rev. Jesse Jackson, head of Operation PUSH, and a delegation from the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) headed by Rev. Joseph Lowery, its president, and Walter Fauntroy, its chairman and the District of Columbia representative in Congress, Firestone reported.
JACKSON: MOSES WAS A TERRORIST
Jackson, who was in New York yesterday to speak at the Progressive National Baptist Convention in Harlem and to attend an Arab League luncheon in honor of United Nations Secretary General Kurt Waldheim, said it was healthy for Black leaders to disagree. He said Blacks could disagree on foreign policy issues without splitting apart. Jackson claimed that Moses was a terrorist who like Arafat “Killed when his people were under occupation.” He said in the case of Moses “God talked to him and changed his mind.”
Jackson charged that there “is terrorism on both sides” is the Mideast. “Neither can break the cycle of terror because the last funeral is the battle for the next terrorist attack. I want the U.S. to break that cycle” by dealing directly with the PLO.
FAUNTROY RAPS JORDAN, RUSTIN
Fauntroy at a press conference in Washington yesterday said the SCLC disagrees with Jordan and Bayard Rustin, executive director of the A, Philip Randolph Institute, who criticized the meetings with the PLO while in Israel yesterday, “if their position is that our appeal for peace through non-violence should not be communicated directly to the PLO by ourselves, leaders of conscience around the world or by the United States government.”
Fauntroy in his press conference also said he saw no difference between the acts of violence committed by Israel and the PLO “For me, Killing is Killing,” he said. Bombs dropping out of the sky are as terrifying as bombs in a shopping center. Whatever you call it, I want the killing to stop.”
Fauntroy said It was “ludicrous” to “equate” the SCLC’s urging of the PLO to end terrorism and recognize Israel with “supporting terrorism and the destruction of Israel.” He noted that the SCLC had withdrawn an invitation to Arafat to come to the U.S. because the PLO had refused to abandon violence against Israel, but also criticized the Israel government for its refusal to meet the 10-member SCLC delegation that met with Arafat.
Jordan was also criticized by the Rev. George Lawrence, a spokesman for the Progressive National Baptist Convention, who accused him of fearing a loss of funds from Jews. “We’re no longer the boys doing what the Jewish community wants us to do in the civil rights movement,” Lawrence said. “It’s a sad commentary on Black unity that some people don’t realize that.”
The leaders of the Progressive National Baptist Convention, which claims to represent 1.5 million Black Baptists, issued an open letter yesterday saying that Jordan’s attack on other Black leaders has “brought an end to the masquerade of the Urban League as a civil rights organization” and Jordan “as a civil rights leader.” The letter was written by Rev. Wyatt Tee Walker, pastor of the Convent Avenue Baptist Church, where the convention was held.
CITES ‘SIDESHOWS’ IN THE MIDEAST
In his Kansas City speech, Jordan also asserted that “the Black civil rights movement is based on non-violent moral principles. It has nothing in common with groups whose claims to legitimacy are compromised by cold-blooded murder of innocent civilians and school children.” He referred to “sideshows” in the Middle East as displacing vital survival issues for Blacks, and mentioned such issues as America’s ghettos, the aspirations of Black America for equality, and the poverty facing Black youth.
“The only ones who will benefit from the Black-Jewish tensions are the enemies of both groups,” Jordan said. He called for strengthening ties between Jews and Blacks, noting that “events following Ambassador (Andrew) Young’s resignation have led to deep strains” in the traditional Black-Jewish alliance. A strengthened alliance between Blacks and Jews would unify American society and improve conditions for the poor, Jordan said.
Meanwhile, the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, which includes many Black and Jewish organizations, has been trying to quell the dispute between Blacks and Jews. “The work that still must be done is too important to let differences divide us,” Clarence M. Mitchell, Conference chairman, and Arnold Aronson, secretary, said in a joint statement yesterday in Washington. “A free pluralistic society demands not the elimination of differences but the expression of differing views without rancor, racism or anti-Semitism.”
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.
