After a visit from Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, Chief Separdic Rabbi in Israel, 14 members of Congress cabled an appeal to Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger and Undersecretary of State Joseph J. Sisco to intercede with the Syrian government to allow the remaining 4000 Jews in that country to emigrate to countries that will receive them.
Rabbi Yosef, attired in his ceremonial robes, met the Congressmen in the office of Rep. Sidney Yates (D. III.), dean of the 12 Jewish members of the House, and described the plight of Syria’s Jews. The cable was sent to the American interests section in Damascus where Kissinger and his party are expected later this week to begin talks for disengagement of Syrian and Israeli forces. It was signed by the 11 Jewish members present and Reps. Robert Anderson (R.III.). Charles A. Vanik (D.Ohio) and John E. Moss (D. Calif.).
Rabbi Yosef also met with Speaker Carl Albert (D.Okla.), Rep. John Rhodes (R.Ariz.) and Sen. John J. Sparkman (D.Ala.), acting head of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in the absence of chairman J. William Fulbright (D.Ark.) The rabbi’s visit to the U.S. was co-sponsored by the American Sephardi Federation and the Sephardi Leadership Council of the United Jewish Appeal of Greater New York.
RABBI JEERED, INSULTED BY YOUTHS
Returning to New York, Rabbi Yosef was subjected to jeering, insults and profanities last night by a large group of earlocked, black-garbed yeshiva students who were identified as members of the extremist Neutral Karta group. Rabbi Yosef was addressing several hundred people inside a synagogue and an overflow crowd of several hundred more outside the synagogue listened to him on loudspeakers when the yeshiva students began to heckle the rabbi. As the rabbi was escorted from the synagogue by policemen fighting broke out between supporters of Mizrachi, the group that sponsored the meeting, and the yeshiva students.
Rabbi Yosef himself was unhurt in the incident as the screaming yeshiva youths were held in check by police and secret service men. Several of the youths were arrested and later released. Stewards appointed by the synagogue committee kept order inside the synagogue during the rabbi’s discourse and allowed no one to leave. Before the rally in Boro Park, Rabbi Yosef had been enthusiastically received by hundreds of Syrian Jews at Beth Tora Congregation in another section of Brooklyn.
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