Starting in the early 1970s, Hikind was a high-ranking member of the Jewish Defense League, a group described in a 2001 FBI report as a “right-wing terrorist group” and a “violent extremist Jewish organization.”
The JDL has been responsible for a slew of bombings, shootings, assaults, break-ins, threats and acts of vandalism since its founding in 1968, including when Hikind was a member.
Because there has been little public accounting of Hikind’s role in the organization, HuffPost sent the assemblyman a detailed list of questions this week about his relationship to the JDL. In response, Hikind gave HuffPost an exclusive statement ― a full copy of which can be read at the bottom of this article ― in which he states that he “couldn’t recall with greater fondness” his time with the group.
“Over 43 years ago, I was very proud to be part of the Jewish Defense League,” Hikind wrote.
Although Hikind claims his role in the JDL was “non-violent,” his statement did not address specific HuffPost questions regarding whether he once called for the assassination of pro-Palestinian Arab-Americans; whether he was a close friend of a man convicted of carrying out 20 bombings in New York and Washington, D.C.; or regarding why the FBI suspected him in plotting six bombings of Arab targets across the U.S.
He did not answer a question regarding whether he had knowledge of, or involvement in, other JDL plots that involved violence or were otherwise illegal. He also did not deny that in 1976 he tossed a smoke bomb into the Ugandan mission at the United Nations in New York, saying in his statement that he did a “few pranks” at the Ugandan mission, “for which I was never charged.”
JDL’s founder, Rabbi Meir Kahane, “consistently preached a radical form of Jewish nationalism which reflected racism, violence and political extremism,” according to the Anti-Defamation League, a prominent Jewish organization that fights anti-Semitism.