The Kahane assassination

On this day in 1990 an oft forgotten, but influential, Rabbi was assassinated in New York. Meir Kahane was the founder of the Jewish Defense League and Kach, a group that would eventually be labeled a terrorist organization. Kach began life as a political party in Israel and would eventually capture a seat in Knesset. Because of Kahane’s inflammatory rhetoric, Kach would be labeled a racist organization was ultimately banned from the Knesset. In 1994, four years after Kahane’s death, Kach was labeled a terrorist group and outlawed in Israel. The event that caused this was the Hebron massacre when an adherent to Kach killed 29 Palestinian Muslims while they were at prayer.

What makes this assassination particularly interesting is the connection to individuals involved in contemporary terrorism. The accused assassin, El Sayyid Nosair, would be acquitted of murder, but would later be convicted as a co-conspirator in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing among other charges. Nosair was convicted along side the notorious Sheik Rahman; otherwise known as the Blind Sheik. Both men received funding for their defense from an up and comer in the terrorist world, Osama bin Laden.

Upon Kahane’s death the Kach movement splintered into two groups; one under the name of Kach and the other run by Binyamin Kahane, Kahane’s son, known as Kahane Chai. Binyamin Kahane would later be assassinated in 2000 in a strange twist of fate. Binyamin, along with his wife and children, were gunned down by members of Force 17 while driving to their home. The members of Force 17 claimed to not know the identity of the people they attacked and later stated it was luck that their victim was Binyamin Kahane.

Force 17 is a group within the Palestinian Fatah movement that has been responsible for numerous terrorist attacks as well as the protection of the Yasser Arafat until his death. Currently the U.S. has been attempting to supply arms to Force 17 to curb the political consolidation efforts of Hamas. Unfortunately many of these weapons find their way into the hands of Hamas terrorists, while the arms that Force 17 does manage to receive are used to attack Israel.

Either coincidence or something else the assassination of Meir Kahane is truly a strange story.

Further notes:

Political leader of the LTTE, Liberation Tigers of Tamil, was killed in an air strike by the Sri Lankan military.

Pakistan looks as if it is about to deteriorate into a civil war. It may become incumbent upon the U.S. or India to remove or destroy Pakistan’s nuclear weapons before they fall into the hands of people who will use them.