Even Irgun-seasoned readers of the New York Herald-Tribune and New York Post were likely taken aback by May’s full-page appeals to finance terror in Palestine. The ads, in the form of an open letter to the Palestinian terrorists by the playwright Ben Hecht, abandoned any pretence of ‘military’ targets, celebrating even the bombing of trains. In what would otherwise be seen as vile anti-Semitism, he states that US Jews take joy at the terror—all except for the “rich Jews”, whom he ridicules.
Every time you blow up a British arsenal, or wreck a British jail, or send a British railroad train sky high, or rob a British bank, or let go with your guns and bombs at the British betrayers and invaders of your homeland, the Jews of America make a little holiday in their hearts ... Brave friends, I can imagine you wondering, “If the Jews of America are behind us why don’t they help us with their support and money?” It so happens that a certain small percentage of the Jews of America are not behind you yet ... Unfortunately, this small percentage includes practically all the rich Jews of America…
See State of Terror, 198-199.
