More than a dozen activists gathered outside NYC's Central Synagogue when the oldest US war criminal, Henry Kissinger, spoke there on April 24. We placed ourselves and our posters directly in front of the synagogue along the curb and at the entering steps, giving out leaflets to those entering, one of which included this quote from Kissinger: “The emigration of Jews from the Soviet Union is not an objective of American foreign policy. And if they put Jews into gas chambers in the Soviet Union, it is not an American concern. Maybe a humanitarian concern.”

An additional number of people stopped to talk to us, some of them joining our line of protesters for brief periods of time.

Although Kissinger event organizers came out and tried to move us away, saying that those entering thought the material we were giving out was official synagogue literature, we stood our ground and remained outside, quietly and politely informing those attending of the numerous crimes of Henry Kissinger.

The protest was sponsored by War Criminals Watch/World Can't Wait, East Timor Action Network, NY War Resisters League, Brooklyn For Peace, Veterans For Peace NYC Chapter 34, School of Americas Watch, Justice First Foundation, Inc., Campaign for Peace and Democracy, Jews Against Genocide and Tikkun Magazine: A quarterly Jewish and Interfaith Critique of Politics, Culture and Society.

Photos: Bud Korotzer