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Soviet Jewry protest leaders in San Francisco secretly recruited help from Jews for Jesus, FBI file says
(JTA) – Organizers of protests on behalf of Soviet Jewry in San Francisco in the early 1970s might have bolstered crowds by secretly recruiting participants from Jews for Jesus.
The explosive revelation that Jewish leaders turned to a Christian missionary group for help appears in a 1973 FBI memo that the Jewish Telegraphic Agency recently obtained through a freedom of information request.
The FBI file details an apparent relationship between Martin Rosen, the founder of Jews for Jesus, and Joel Brooks and Harold Light, two prominent San Francisco Jewish leaders at the fore of local efforts in the movement to get Soviet authorities to end restrictions on the emigration of the country’s Jewish population. The relationship outlined in the declassified memo has not appeared in scholarship on the Soviet Jewry movement, nor is it known to activists of the movement who were interviewed by JTA. Light, Brooks and Rosen are deceased.
If the FBI’s intelligence is accurate, a successful and cherished social movement that unified much of the global Jewish community in common purpose for decades relied at least to some extent in San Francisco on the support of a group, rejected by nearly all of that community, whose mission is to proselytize to Jews.
“The first thing I thought of was, I’m reading something from ‘The Twilight Zone’ — in my many years in the Soviet Jewry movement, I don’t know if I’ve seen a document as strange as this,” said Morey Schapira, who served in leadership positions in the Student Struggle for Soviet Jewry, the Bay Area Council for Soviet Jews, and the Union of Councils for Soviet Jews. “The idea of working with a slimy group like Jews for Jesus, it’s beyond my comprehension.”
The public can request any FBI files that may exist pertaining to deceased individuals. An FBI memo relating Rosen arrived last November in response to one of about 50 freedom of information requests on prominent figures in recent Jewish history submitted by JTA almost two years ago. Most of JTA’s requests are still pending. TO DOWNLOAD THE FBI FILE, CLICK HERE.
Dated May 24, 1973, and written by an FBI informant whose name was redacted by staff at the U.S. National Archive, the memo focuses on Brooks, who was the Northern California director of the American Jewish Congress for about 30 years starting in 1967.
“[Brooks] has heavily utilized the services of the young Jews in the Jews for Jesus group,” the informant wrote. “[He] has used these services to turn out people in his Soviet Jewry demonstrations.”
The informant also cites Brooks as saying that Light, leader of the Bay Area Council for Soviet Jewry, used members of Jews for Jesus in a “hush-hush way” to distribute leaflets and participate in demonstrations.
The memo spells out why such an arrangement would be best kept out of the public eye.
“All of this, of course, is secret, because organized Jewish groups, and the various rabbinical councils have proclaimed that Jews for Jesus are no longer Jews but have become apostates, and should not be palled around with, nor buried in Jewish cemeteries,” the informant writes.
Martin “Moishe” Rosen, founder of Jews for Jesus in 1975. (Denver Post via Getty Images)
The upside for Rosen was obvious: His group would gain a foothold in a popular Jewish movement, offering a potential avenue toward legitimacy and a pool of possible recruits. In his 1974 memoir, titled “Jews for Jesus,” Rosen openly discussed being accepted into the movement by Jewish organizers, but he did so without naming Brooks, Light or any others.
He wrote that Jews for Jesus were invited because of their reputation as the “best qualified, best disciplined demonstrators in the San Francisco community. We’ve had more experience than other Jewish groups and are familiar with the applicable laws and regulations.”
Rosen’s group committed to not use the demonstrations as an opportunity to evangelize and didn’t bring any Christian literature or wear outfits that would identify them, according to the memoir.
“Many Jews for Jesus believe in the freedom of Soviet Jewry just as strongly as any other Jews, and we want to be as effective as possible when we demonstrate to support that cause,” Rosen wrote.
To Schapira, who led the Bay Area Council for Soviet Jews for years and knew both Brooks and Light, however, it’s unclear why the Soviet Jewry movement would have wanted or needed Jews for Jesus. Schapira didn’t recall it ever being especially difficult to turn out demonstrators organically. There didn’t seem to be a need to resort to secret deals.
“If you look at the picture of the rallies in those days, they even had people like [American folk music legend] Joan Baez,” Schapira said. “They developed a relationship with her and she would come to the rally and bring her guitar and sing songs for freedom.”
He added, “If we needed an instant rally, we were a grassroots organization and we could produce 10 or 12 people, which might be enough to send a message to the Russians and get some publicity in the local papers.”
At least a few people in the Bay Area’s Jewish community caught wind of the secret relationship between Brooks and Jews for Jesus at the time, according to the memo.
Stephanie Rodgers was a coordinator of the Jewish Defense League, an extremist right-wing Jewish group that was under heavy FBI surveillance. Founded by Rabbi Meir Kahane, the JDL applied its often violent tactics to resist Jews for Jesus’ public campaign to convert Jews. Rodgers visited Brooks’ office ahead of a planned demonstration in front of the Soviet consulate in San Francisco and asked about his connection to Rosen and Jews for Jesus, according to the memo.
After Brooks explained how they had been useful, Rodgers “smiled and was very pleasant on the surface,” the memo says. But at the demonstration, Rodgers and a group of other JDL activists showed up even though they said they would stay away, and they found Rosen in the crowd and proceeded to attack him and “kicked him in the groin.”
JDL regularly disrupted Jews for Jesus events; the organization would ultimately claim responsibility for firebombing a bus operated by Jews for Jesus in Brooklyn and abducting an adherent. In the Bay Area, where both groups were active, tensions were particularly high; the Jewish Defense League would sue the local Jews for Jesus chapter over what it charged was the group’s misuse of the JDL’s name and imagery.
Brooks, meanwhile, had more affable ties with Jews for Jesus. It’s unclear how or when Rosen and Brooks developed a relationship, but Brooks noted in a July 25, 1972, letter he wrote to the office of the American Jewish Congress in New York that their ties had started “some time ago.” The letter is found in the records of the Northern California branch of the American Jewish Congress, which are archived at the University of California Berkeley’s library.
A prominent advocacy group in its heyday, the American Jewish Congress — not to be confused with the American Jewish Committee — took a more liberal political stance than that of Jewish establishment groups on many issues.
Brooks had learned that his organization’s national headquarters wanted to undertake a study of Jews for Jesus and he wished to provide insight. He was under no illusion about the group’s objective: “The sole aim of these men is to enlist new converts to Christianity,” Brooks wrote in the letter.
“Through contact with Rosen I have developed a great deal of insight into how his organization operates, their source of funding, budget, etc. which I wish to share with you,” he added.
Then as now, members of Jews for Jesus and other Messianic groups felt unfairly rejected by the Jewish world, arguing that their Christian beliefs should have a place in the community.
In the early 1970s, when Jews for Jesus’ conversion drive was prominent and well funded, Brooks was perceived as more lenient, according to the foreword to the 2017 book “Converging Destinies: Jews, Christians, and the Mission of God.”
“Brooks tried to keep some of us connected to the Jewish community and Jewish life,” Calvin J. Smith wrote in the foreword. “I remember going with another Jew for Jesus to a Jewish consciousness raising session he held at a home in Marin County in the early 1970s.”
Glenn Richter was one of the founders of the Student Struggle for Soviet Jewry and operates as a walking encyclopedia of the movement.
Protestors dressed as prisoners behind bars, alongside a man holding a placard reading “Solidarity with Soviet Jews,” stand together with members of New York’s Jewish community as they take to the streets during the Solidarity Sunday for Soviet Jewry demonstration in protest at the Soviet Union’s treatment of Jewish people, in New York City, April 18, 1975. (Images Press/Keystone/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)
He said the movement did collaborate with many Christians outside of Jews for Jesus. For example, he said there were Scandinavians, who, on weekend trips to Leningrad (today St. Petersburg), brought in Jewish material that was banned in the Soviet Union. Others set up safe houses in Finland in expectation of fleeing Soviet Jews. And the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews raised millions of dollars from evangelicals to help transport Soviet Jews to Israel.
“Of course, among these goodhearted souls are those who have conversion of Jews in mind, but I suspect most have wanted to fulfill their prophecy of ingathering Jews to Israel so that a Christian messiah could return,” Richter said.
In his eyes, Jews for Jesus represented a red line.
“Our Student Struggle for Soviet Jewry office on Manhattan’s West 72nd Street was down the block from a church with a Jewish Messianic constituency, and we would never, ever, try to work with them,” Richter said.
Andrew Esensten contributed research to this story.
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NYC synagogue protest leads to a new bill, and a rally by Jewish groups outside Park East shul
(JTA) — A demonstration outside Park East Synagogue two weeks ago, during which protesters shouted chants like “Death to the IDF” and “Globalize the Intifada,” has spurred major Jewish groups and lawmakers into action.
A coalition of Jewish groups are organizing a solidarity gathering on Manhattan’s Upper East Side Thursday night, outside the same synagogue where pro-Palestinian groups protested an event promoting immigration to Israel — a scene that NYPD commissioner Jessica Tisch later referred to as “turmoil.”
The rally “will bring our community together in that same sacred space to celebrate and defend our community’s values and support Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish homeland,” according to a press release from UJA-Federation of New York.
UJA is partnering on the rally with Park East Synagogue itself, as well as the Jewish Community Relations Council, the New York Board of Rabbis, and local branches of the Anti-Defamation League and the American Jewish Committee.
They’ve also listed dozens of Jewish organizations, schools and congregations as partners. Schools and synagogues around the city were sharing information with families about how to commute to the rally.
The gathering will feature live performances, community leaders and elected officials, according to UJA’s release, though it did not specify who would be present.
The rally is set to take place on the heels of newly introduced legislation, brought forward on Wednesday by a pair of Jewish lawmakers — Assembly member Micah Lasher and State Sen. Sam Sutton — that proposes banning protests within 25 feet of houses of worship.
“New York must always be a place where people can both exercise free speech and express their religious identity without fear or intimidation, and that balance broke down outside Park East Synagogue,” said Micah Lasher, who is running for Congress in New York’s 12th district, which includes Park East.
The bill was co-sponsored by fellow Jewish lawmakers Nily Rozic, a Democratic Assembly member, and Sen. Liz Krueger, who endorsed mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani in the general election.
Many Jewish groups were disappointed with the initial response to the incident by Mamdani’s spokesperson, who said that while Mamdani would “discourage the language used” at the protest, “these sacred spaces should not be used to promote activities in violation of international law.” The second clause was a reference to complaints that the synagogue event’s organizers facilitate immigration to the West Bank, which most countries consider illegally occupied by Israel under international law.
Critics said Mamdani’s statement drew an unfair comparison between menacing protesters and a synagogue exercising its commitment to Jewish communities in what the ADL referred to as their “ancestral homeland,” and that the protest made no distinction between immigration to Israel and the West Bank.
Rabbi Marc Schneier, who has been a harsh critic of Mamdani and is the son of Park East’s senior rabbi, said on WABC that he’s had multiple phone calls with the mayor-elect about legislation like the bill proposed by Lasher and Sutton.
Schneier said Mamdani was receptive to the idea during their discussions, and a Mamdani spokesperson told The New York Times that the mayor-elect “expressed his interest in hearing more details about the Schneier pitch.”
Jewish leaders say they are looking to Thursday as an opportunity to counter the rhetoric used outside Park East.
Chaim Steinmetz, a critic of Mamdani and the senior rabbi of a different Orthodox synagogue on the Upper East Side, shared a post about Thursday’s rally, calling it an opportunity to “stand up as proud Jews.”
“And now, with a new city administration about to take office, it is more important than ever that we bring our pride into the streets,” he wrote.
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LA mayor condemns protest outside synagogue event that featured Israeli defense firm
An anti-Israel demonstration outside a prominent Los Angeles synagogue led to two arrests Wednesday, drawing condemnation from the city’s mayor who decried the protesters’ behavior as antisemitic.
Multiple local pro-Palestinian groups promoted the protest outside Wilshire Boulevard Temple, a Reform synagogue, which was hosting a program on the intersection of artificial intelligence and public safety that featured speakers from Israeli defense firm Elbit Systems, the Israeli police and the local Jewish federation. The event was organized by the Israeli Consulate General of Los Angeles.
Videos from the scene uploaded to social media showed around 20 protesters, many clad in masks and keffiyehs, gathering outside the entrance to the Audrey Irmas Pavilion, a neighboring event space owned by the synagogue, and engaging in heated arguments with people on their way into the event.
The protesters hung a large banner that said “Elbit out of Los Angeles” and “Genociders not welcome,” and distributed flyers that said Elbit was responsible for weapons and technology that Israel uses against Palestinian civilians and that ICE uses in the U.S.
A spokesperson for the Los Angeles Police Department said officers arrested one person for battery and another for vandalism.
Rabbi Joel Nickerson, the synagogue’s head rabbi, called the incident “a disturbing outbreak of hate” in a statement.
“These individuals targeted the Jewish community and chose to disrupt a community event on synagogue property that was focused on advancing public safety in Koreatown,” he said, adding, “No one should be targeted in the City of Los Angeles on account of their faith.”
Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass said in a statement that protesters were calling attendees antisemitic names and had damaged property inside the synagogue. She said additional LAPD officers had been deployed to patrol near areas of worship.
“This behavior is abhorrent and has no place in Los Angeles,” Bass said. “I spoke with Rabbi Nickerson to ensure he and his congregation know that the City of Los Angeles stands with them and fully condemns these attacks.”
It was unclear how many protesters gained access to the building or how they were able to. The damaged property appeared to include a broken vase, according to video from the scene posted to social media.
The Jewish Federation of Greater Los Angeles said in a statement that the protest was “antisemitism and hate disguised as dissent.”
“We are outraged and condemn this antisemitic behavior in the strongest of terms,” it said.
The protest appeared to be coordinated by multiple groups, among them Koreatown for Palestine, a local chapter of the Palestinian Youth Movement and the far-left group People’s City Council Los Angeles. They urged their social media followers to call in their concerns prior to the event to the synagogue and to the Audrey Irmas Pavilion, and to arrive early Wednesday to picket outside the latter.
“We KNOW that these technologies are created on the targeting and killing of Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank, and will do the same to vulnerable communities in Ktown,” the Palestinian Youth Movement chapter wrote Tuesday on Instagram.
Titled “Innovating Safety, Empowering Communities,” Wednesday’s symposium was billed as an event that would strengthen bonds between Jews, Israelis, Koreans and Korean Americans. The Korean American Federation of Los Angeles’ emblem appears on a flyer for the event.
The program included appearances from Gal Ben Ish, the Israel Police Attache to North America, and Goni Saar from Elbit Systems. Saar’s LinkedIn profile says he is a strategic business development manager for the firm; a program for the event said he presented on “public safety AI tools.”
Saar did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Also speaking were the head of the Jewish federation’s Community Security Initiative, and Sheva Cho, a Korean singer who moved to Israel in 2012.
Elbit is one of the oldest and largest defense companies in Israel, employing some 18,000 people, and it developed the drones IDF has used heavily in its wars following the Oct. 7 attacks. An Elbit Hermes 450 drone reportedly struck the World Central Kitchen aid convoy in April 2024, killing seven aid workers.
According to the Elbit website, artificial intelligence tools have played a major role in Israel’s war in Gaza.
“From unmanned aerial systems and drones to electronic warfare, intelligence gathering, robotics and more, AI played an important role,” an article on the website reads. “Elbit is leading some of these directions like autonomous vehicles, different platforms and weapons that are targeted and analyzed constantly with AI, drones, AI on a strategic level to analyze different signals that can show how the enemy is working (including in civilian areas).”
People’s City Council Los Angeles did not return a request for comment, but pushed back against the assertion that the protest was antisemitic in posts Wednesday night on X.
“The ‘private event’ in question was put on by the Consulate General of Israel,” the organization wrote in a response to Bass’ post. “It featured Goni Saar from Elbit Systems and the Israel Police Attache to North America, Gal Ben Ish. It took place at Audrey Irmas Pavilion, an events venue, not Wilshire Boulevard Temple.”
Wilshire Boulevard Temple is one of the oldest synagogues on the West Coast, dating its construction to the 1920s; the congregation itself was founded in the 19th century. But the Audrey Irmas Pavilion is a recent addition, opening in 2021. It has since been featured in the Netflix show Nobody Wants This.
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China Slams Israel for Joining UN Human Rights Statement Condemning Beijing
Israel’s Ambassador to the United Nations Danny Danon addressing the UN Security Council on Sept. 19, 2024. Photo: Screenshot
China slammed Israel on Wednesday for joining a United Nations declaration condemning its human rights record, accusing some nations of “slandering” Beijing on the international stage as bilateral relations between the two countries grow increasingly tense.
Last week, Israel endorsed a US-backed declaration, signed by 15 other countries — including the United Kingdom, Australia, and Japan — that expressed “deep and ongoing concerns” over human rights violations in China.
In a rare move, Jerusalem broke with its traditionally cautious approach to China — aimed at preserving diplomatic and economic ties — by signing on to the statement as Beijing continues to strengthen relations with Iran, whose Islamic government openly seeks Israel’s destruction, and expand its influence in the Middle East.
China, a key diplomatic and economic backer of Tehran, has moved to deepen ties with the regime in recent years, signing a 25-year cooperation agreement, holding joint naval drills, and continuing to purchase Iranian oil despite US sanctions.
China is the largest importer of Iranian oil, with nearly 90 percent of Iran’s crude and condensate exports going to Beijing.
Iran’s growing ties with China come at a time when Tehran faces mounting economic sanctions from Western powers, while Beijing itself is also under US sanctions.
According to some media reports, China may be even helping Iran rebuild its decimated air defenses following the 12-day war with Israel in June.
With this latest UN declaration, the signatory countries denounced China’s repression of ethnic and religious minority groups, citing arbitrary detentions, forced labor, mass surveillance, and restrictions on cultural and religious expression.
According to the statement, minority groups — particularly Uyghurs, other Muslim communities, Christians, Tibetans, and Falun Gong practitioners — face targeted repression, including the separation of children from their families, torture, and the destruction of cultural heritage.
In response, China’s Foreign Ministry accused the signatories of “slandering and smearing” the country and interfering in its internal affairs “in serious violation of international law and basic norms of international relations.”
The UN declaration also voiced “deep concern” over the erosion of civil liberties and the rule of law in Hong Kong, citing arrest warrants and fines for activists abroad, as well as the use of state censorship and surveillance to control information, suppress public debate, and create a “climate of fear” that silences criticism.
Western powers called on China to release all individuals unjustly detained for exercising their human rights and fundamental freedoms and to fully comply with international law.
Israel’s latest diplomatic move comes amid an already tense relationship with China, strained since the start of the war in Gaza. In September, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accused Beijing, along with Qatar, of funding a “media blockade” against the Jewish state.
At the time, the Chinese embassy in Israel dismissed such accusations, saying they “lack factual basis [and] harm China-Israel relations.”