Aftermath Of Violence

Freedom To Incite

A determined band of virulent hatemongers remains above the law.

VINCENT COPPOLA

Special to the Jewish News

I

n the mid-1980s, when I
arrived in Hayden Lake, Idaho,
Aryan Nations, with its razor
wire and guard tower, was a
shouted obscenity
among the pristine
News
forests of the Pacific
Analysis
Northwest. Inside
the Church of Jesus
Christ Christian, a
portrait of Hitler hung on the wall
and an inverted sword passed for a
crucifix.
Aryan Nations' founder Richard
Girnt Butler, an old man, kept a
lever-action Winchester mounted on
the wall above his head. A book —
Genetic Diseases Among the Jewish
People, lay open on his desk.
"Why do you hate Jews?" I asked.
"I can't hate a thing for what it is,"
he countered. "I'm not particularly
fond of rattlesnakes either." He
dodged and feinted through the rest

Buford 0 Neal Furrow Jr., the suspect in the Los Angeles Jewish community center
shootings, is led out of federal court in Las Vegas last week.

of our talk, ever mindful of my tape
recorder.
Butler preached Aryans were the
true Israel. Jews were Satanic, the off-
spring of Eve and the Serpent. They'd
stolen the Anglo-Saxons' true identi-
ty. In Butler's theology, Christ
demanded that his disciples "hate
with a perfect hatred."
An Aryan Nations splinter

group, the Bruders Schweigen
(Silent Brotherhood), had assassi-
nated Jewish talk radio host Alan
Berg in Denver. The murder, the
first in a series of bombings, armed
robberies and cop-killings, was sup-
posed to trigger the "Second
American Revolution." Robert Jay
Matthews, the group's leader, was
killed in a shootout with federal

agents. Nearly two dozen others
were tried and sentenced.
Richard Butler, whose virulent
rhetoric had triggered the mayhem, =J
was never prosecuted.
During my visit, a short, muscle-
bound man named David Dorr
stayed close to Butler, as his body-
guard and lackey.
Looking back, I see how clearly
Dorr prefigured Buford Furrow Jr.,
the Aryan Nations disciple who
believed murdering Jewish children
was an act of courage. Dorr, behind
his bluster, was an insecure, ill-
schooled man. He'd missed the Silent
Brotherhood's war against ZOG
(Zionist Occupation Government), a
particular focus of Butler's tortured
imagination. He wanted to prove
himself.
"The little Jews don't bother me,"
Dorr told me. "It's the Rothschilds
and the Rockefeller Jews."
Dorr and two Aryan Nations'
associates went on to bomb a federal
office building and a Catholic

Besting Hate's Legions

Two Berkley teens helped distract a town from a Ku Klux Klan rally.

DIANA LIEBERMAN

Staff Writer

IV hen the Ku Klux Klan
decided to hold a rally
in a western Michigan
town this summer, two
Oakland County teens found them-
selves in an unexpected spotlight.
Idan Phillips and Max Sussman
spent the summer as junior coun-
selors at Camp Tavor, a Habonim
(Labor Zionist Alliance) camp in
Three Rivers. The two Berkley
High School seniors were part of a
group that was determined not to

8/20
1999

14 Detroit Jewish News

let hatred get a foothold in the
town. They couldn't stop the rally,
so they decided to take away its
potential audience.
"At these rallies, people turn up to
oppose the Klan and it gets violent,"
Sussman said. "So the city decided to
have a positive goal, something to
attract young people."
The response was Three Rivers'
first "Celebrating Diversity" festival
and open house held at the
Healthtrac athletic club of the Three
Rivers Area Hospital. The event took
place at the same time as the Klan
march, but at the other end of town.

"They are really looking for atten-
tion, and the more press they have,
the more attention they get,"
Sussman said. This way, when peo-
ple read about it, it was positive
rather than negative. The Klan didn't
get much attention at all."
Phillips was master of ceremonies
and Sussman was disc jockey at the
celebration.
"I guess the reason we were chosen
is we are outgoing. We're not afraid
to be in the spotlight," Phillips said.
Each had an assistant, volunteers
from the ranks of other Camp Tavor
teens. Other campers helped with

food, organization and storekeeping
for the event, which included three-
on-three basketball, a skateboarding
tournament, swimming and dance-
offs. Local restaurants contributed
pizza, chicken, ribs and orange drink.
In addition to combating the
Klan, the event brought the Tavor
campers closer to the community.
"It was the first real intefaction we
had with them," Sussman said,
"aside from coming into town to
get ice cream."
Event organizer Matt Chambers
said the town didn't have much time
to plan for the Klan march. They