The Jewish Defense League (JDL) is a Jewish far-right organization whose stated goal is to "protect Jews from antisemitism by whatever means necessary". While the group asserts that it "unequivocally condemns terrorism" and states that it has a "strict no-tolerance policy against terrorism and other felonious acts," it was described as "a right-wing terrorist group" by the FBI in 2001. According to the FBI, the JDL has been involved in plotting and executing numerous acts of terrorism within the United States. The JDL's website states that it rejects terrorism.
Founded by Rabbi Meir Kahane in New York City in 1968, JDL's self-described purpose was to protect Jews from local manifestations of antisemitism. Its criticism of the Soviet Union garnered support for the group, transforming it from a "vigilante club" into an activist organization with membership numbering over 15,000 at one point. The group took to bombing Arab and Soviet properties in the United States, and targeting various alleged "enemies of the Jewish people", ranging from Arab-American political activists to neo-Nazis, for assassination. A number of JDL members have been linked to violent, and sometimes deadly, attacks in the United States and in other countries, including the murder of American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee regional director Alex Odeh in 1985, the Cave of the Patriarchs massacre in 1994, and a plot to kill U.S. Congressman Darrell Issa in 2001. The National Memorial Institute for the Prevention of Terrorism's database of identified terrorist organizations, which is compiled by official contractors and consultants to the United States government and is supported by the Department of Homeland Security, identifies the JDL as a "former terrorist organization".
The group has been criticized by the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) for presenting a "gross distortion" of the real situation of American Jews. According to ADL, the Jewish Defense League consists only of "thugs and hooligans". The ADL states that JDL's founder, Meir Kahane, "preached a radical form of Jewish nationalism which reflected racism, violence and political extremism" and adds that those attitudes were replicated by Irv Rubin, the successor to Kahane. In 2002, the Southern Poverty Law Center added the Jewish Defense League to its list of watched hate groups for its "long history of bombing, assaulting and threatening its perceived enemies" such as "the Soviet Union, neo-Nazi activists, Palestinian leaders, prominent black Americans and even Jewish moderates" as well as other Jewish radicals, and stated that the JDL "claims to have 13,000 members, but apparently has a few dozen at best."
Read more about Jewish Defense League: Terrorism, Ruthless Records, Schism: October 2004-April 2006, Relations With Other Groups, JDL's Five Principles, JDL Chairmen
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