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History of Information Sharing With Israel
Bullock's attorney turned over to investigators an FBI
intelligence report on the Nation of Islam whose disappearance
had caused alarm at the bureau. The search of ADL offices in San
Francisco and Los Angeles turned up more FBI materials, including
a three-volume report on a Middle East terrorist group. Moreover,
Bullock's written reports to the ADL, which he said were
channeled across the country, contained legally confidential
material that he attributed to "official friends," the ADL's
euphemism for law enforcement officers.
While denying that the ADL spies on individuals, Foxman testily
argued in an interview that the organization has a right to do
whatever it must within the law to combat antisemitism. "What are
they [the FBI volumes] doing in our files?" Foxman said. "Because
they belong in our files. ... because somebody shared it with
us."
Since news of the investigation broke, a group of Arab
Americans listed in the ADL's files has charged in a civil
lawsuit that the ADL invaded the Arab Americans' privacy with its
"massive spying operation" and forwarded confidential information
to the governments of Israel and South Africa.
Evidence of the ADL's information sharing with the Israeli
government is largely historical. In 1961, former ADL national
director Benjamin R. Epstein wrote to a B'nai B'rith official
that the ADL was following Arab diplomats and activists in
America and sharing its information with the governments of
Israel and the United States.
In his 1988 autobiography, ADL general counsel Arnold Forster,
who oversaw the fact-finding operation, described how "fact-
finding and counteraction became the heart of the organization."
He also wrote that he was often a "source" for the Mossad,
Israel's CIA, in tracking down suspected war criminals.
"ADL does not act as an agent of Israel," said Foxman,
bristling at the charge. He called such questions about ADL's
conduct "antisemitism. ... I'm sorry if it offends some people.
This is far reaching. We see a conspiracy. I see a conspiracy.
It's out there ... it's proved itself every day."
Underlying the San Francisco case is a gradual evolution in the
ADL's mission. Soon after the organization was founded, the 1915
lynching of Leo Frank, a leader of the Atlanta chapter of the
Jewish fraternal organization B'nai B'rith, caused the group to
focus much of its energy on protecting the physical safety of
Jews by publicly exposing bigotry and forcing officials to act.
Organized intelligence gathering was a natural outgrowth. In
the 1930s, the ADL "undertook a massive research operation which
uncovered the interlocking directorates of hate groups, their
links to Hitler's Germany and other centers of Nazi propaganda,"
according to an ADL account. In the civil rights era, it worked
in concert with the FBI to combat the Ku Klux Klan.
In 1975, the ADL issued a report entitled "Target U.S.A.: The
Arab Propaganda Offensive" that described how mainstream Arab-
American groups were allied with non-Arab "apologists" such as
"some church people, clergy and lay, a number of university-based
intellectuals and scholars, plus elements in the liberal
community ... some groups formerly active in the antiwar movement
during the U.S. involvement in Vietnam, plus the extreme Left,
Old and New, segments of the political Far Right, and the
traditional anti-Jewish hate fringe . . . and a small number of
anti-Israel, anti-Zionist Jews."
Once this broad rationale took hold, the civil rights watchdog
increasingly devoted its investigative apparatus to
"counteracting" what it calls "anti-Israel" sentiment or "the new
antisemitism" in the United States.
In practice, this means the ADL keeps track of politically
active Americans or groups that repeatedly criticize Israel or
lobby for Palestinian rights. The ADL argues that any threat to
Israel's "image" in America endangers the $3 billion annual
package of U.S. military and economic aid to Israel and thereby
jeopardizes the long-term fate of all Jews.
"I understand that it's difficult for other people to
understand," said Foxman, but a "viable, safe, secure haven" in
Israel is "part and parcel of the safety and security and
survival of the Jewish people."
Bullock's work as described in the lengthy transcripts of his
interviews with police and in FBI summaries of his
statements tracks the shift in the ADL's emphasis. In the 1960s
and 1970s, he focused primarily on tradtional organized
antisemitic extremist organizations. But during the 1980s,
Bullock said he increasingly focused on groups critical of
Israeli policies, such as anti-apartheid groups, but not overtly
antisemitic.
Bullock's computer database grew to include more than 10,000
names of individuals and hundreds of political, social and
business groups, including some that had worked closely with the
ADL. But his primary concentration was on groups he labeled
"Right," "Arabs," "Pinkos," and "Skins." He acknowledged sharing
his information with law enforcement, a fact investigators
confirmed when they searched Gerard's police department files and
found duplicates of Bullock's files. Bullock told police that ADL
officials knew about his database.
Bullock said he got "checks regular once-a-week" from the ADL
that were paid through Los Angeles attorney Bruce Hochman.
Hochman said in an interview that he paid Bullock at the ADL's
request to protect the undercover role.
Bullock told police that he met Gerard at a meeting at the San
Francisco ADL office and that executive director Richard
Hirschhaut was aware that Gerard was a key source.
The ADL dispatched Bullock on special assignments to Chicago
and Germany. For a particularly sensitive operation he said he
got the approval of Irwin Suall, national director of fact
finding. Both officials have come under scrutiny in the
investigation. Suall and Hirschhaut declined comment.
Bullock told police he was the ADL's "resident expert" on
antisemitism in San Francisco and maintained the ADL office
files. He said he was the only "fact finder, spy, whatever you
want to call me, on the West Coast."
Bullock monitored several of the groups profiled in the ADL's
published reports, occasional exposes that are a blend of
advocacy journalism and intelligence briefings. In 1987, Bullock
volunteered to work on a march of the Mobilization for Jobs,
Peace and Justice, a coalition of liberal groups that included
the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC), according
to director Carl Finamore.
"He [Bullock] just showed up at our office one day to help. He
comes in, he's friendly, insinuates himself, asserts himself,
tells a little bit about his personal background to get you
interested in him as a human being, makes suggestions," Finamore
said.
Some `Material Is Clearly Contraband'
The ADL wanted information on the ADC, a group that challenges
defamatory Arab stereotypes, because it considered the
organization a "highly active pro-PLO propaganda group." An ADL
report said the ADC's members favor "political support for
suspected PLO terrorists residing in the U.S."
Bullock also volunteered at the ADC's San Francisco Bay Area
chapter, where he carried banners, helped with crowd control
during demonstrations and took photographs, according to Osama
Doumani, who at the time served as the ADC's regional director.
"He would come to my office and he would hug me in a comradely
fashion and volunteer for work. He wanted to have a presence
whenever we had something important," he said.
The ADL has labored to draw a distinction between Bullock's
more controversial activities and work he was authorized to do
for ADL, leaving investigators largely unconvinced.
In a court affidavit, San Francisco Police Inspector Ronald
Roth said that based on a comparison of Bullock's database with
the seized ADL records, "It is believed that Bullock's databases
are in fact the ADL databases."
Assistant District Attorney Thomas Dwyer argued in court that
"some of that [ADL] material is clearly contraband." The ADL, he
said, does not "have the right to rap sheet photographs; they do
not have the right to people's fingerprint cards."
But Foxman and other ADL officials say its fact finders
basically employ the methods of investigative journalists, taking
notes at public meetings, culling published material for facts,
and cultivating law enforcement sources, in order to publish
important exposes about bigotry and prejudice.
"It's a First Amendment right," Foxman said. "We have a right
to gather information and to disseminate it. ... We look at
pieces. We look at individuals. We look at ideologies."
[end]
The Washington Post
October 19, 1993
page A13
EVOLUTION OF THE ANTI-DEFAMATION LEAGUE
FULL NAME: Anti-Defamation League of B'nai B'rith.
MISSION: "The immediate object of the league is to stop, by
appeals to reason and conscience, and if necessary, by
appeals to law, the defamation of the Jewish people and
to secure justice and fair treatment to all citizens
alike." (ADL founding charter, 1913)
ORGANIZATION: National director Abraham H. Foxman oversees 200
staff members who work in New York, Washington, and 30
regional offices in major cities. About 15,000 ADL
supporters donate time, money and advice.
BUDGET: $31 million in 1992, chiefly raised through donations to
the ADL, which is a tax exempt 501(c)(3) nonprofit
foundation established for educational purposes.
BRIEF HISTORY:
1913 ?? A group of Jewish attorneys in Chicago forms the ADL,
using a grant from B'nai B'rith, an international
fraternal organization.
1915 ?? Lynching of Atlanta B'nai B'rith leader Leo Frank
galvanizes the ADL to work toward protecting the physical
safety of Jews.
1930s ?? The ADL leads the U.S. fight against pro-Fascist groups
and "America First" isolationists, establishing a pattern
in which ADL research was shared with federal agencies.
1940s ?? The ADL emphasizes involvement in civil rights
litigation, contesting harsh immigration policies and
opposing restrictive covenants that prevented Jews from
moving into desirable neighborhoods.
1950s ?? The ADL supplies federal agencies with information on
alleged subversives, but also challenges Sen. Joseph R.
McCarthy (R-Wis.) and works quietly to clear those
wrongly accused of being communists or their
sympathizers.
1960s ?? The ADL works closely with law enforcement authorities
on various types of civil rights litigation. It forms
department of Middle Eastern affairs after the Six Day
War in 1967 underscores Israel's vulnerability.
1970s ?? The ADL increasingly focuses on the threat to Israel of
pro-Arab or anti-Israel advocates in the United States,
especially their efforts to persuade the United States to
end its military assistance to Israel.
1980s ?? The ADL emerges as a vigorous member of the pro-Israel
lobby, even as it continues to investigate left- and
right-wing extremist groups. It develops a model for hate
crimes legislation, which recently was upheld by the U.S.
Supreme Court.
Recent ADL reports: In addition to its annual audits of antisemitic
incidents, the ADL has published reports that discussed the views of
such diverse figures as Patrick J. Buchanan, David Duke, Lyndon H.
LaRouche, Jr., and Louis Farrakhan. It has issued studies on
antisemitic sentiment among black nationalist and left-wing radicals;
the continuing activities of Ku Klux Klan leaders, the pursuit of
Nazi war criminals, the phenomenon of Skinheads and several reports
on what it calls the "anti-Israel Lobby" or pro-Arab propaganda
groups in the United States.
Compiled by Barbara J. Saffir from news services and ADL.
[end]
The Washington Post
October 19, 1993
page A12
Case of the Critical Librarians
Research on Bibliographer Used to Counter Vote on Israeli Censorship
by Jim McGee
Reference librarian David L. Williams says he learned firsthand how
the ADL's fact-finding operation uses information to counteract
critics of Israel.
Williams, who works at the Chicago Public Library, was listed in
ADL fact finder Roy H. Bullock's files as an "Arab" activist.
Involved in liberal causes since the Vietnam War, Williams in 1977
joined the Palestine Human Rights Campaign (PHRC), a Chicago-based
group that published a newsletter about what it considered human
rights abuses by Israel. The ADL has described the PHRC as an "anti-
Israeli propaganda group."
The Chicago ADL office built up a file on Williams, according to
Barry Morrison, who headed the city's ADL office at the time. Bullock
told the FBI that he was sent to Chicago on special assignment
specifically to investigate the PHRC. Williams's name was listed in
the database that Bullock shared with a San Francisco police
intelligence officer, Thomas Gerard.
Williams's interest in the rights of Palestinians dovetailed with
his duties at the Chicago Public Library, where he was assigned to
order books on the Middle East. In 1989, Williams prepared an in-
house bibliography for the Chicago library system on the Palestinian-
Israeli conflict.
The ADL thought the bibliography was weighted in favor of the pro-
Palestinian authors and went to Williams's superiors with its
information on his political activities.
Williams also was a member of the American Library Association
(ALA), which for years has approved resolutions condemning censorship
in other countries. In 1992, Williams and other ALA members persuaded
the association to adopt a resolution criticizing Israeli censorship
in the occupied territories of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.
Morrison met privately with ALA officials to argue that a
resolution singling out Israel was unfair and laid out the ADL's
information on Williams. ALA President Marilyn Miller said she told
the ADL officials that "we don't censor our own members."
"Obviously I felt strongly that ALA should take a stand on this or
I wouldn't have gone to them with this," Williams said. "... They
[the ADL] equate that with antisemitism."
In February, the ADL issued a news release condemning the ALA for
its failure to retract what the ADL called a "false and biased anti-
Israel resolution." The release noted that the ADL "fights
antisemitism and all forms of bigotry."
"When we ultimately found that despite numerous efforts that we had
failed, then we chose to condemn and attack the ALA," Morrison said.
"Ultimately their officials are responsible for the image, reputation
and stature of their organization."
"I think they [the ALA] were made to feel that they were in danger
of being condemned for being antisemitic for voicing any kind of
criticism of Israel," said Mark Rosenweig, a Jewish librarian from
New York who supported the ALA's censorship resolution.
The ADL began working at the "grass-roots level," according to
Morrison, encouraging Jewish librarians in the library association to
push for retraction of the measure. An ALA group called the Jewish
Librarians Committee took the lead; a fact sheet prepared by the ADL
was distributed to ALA members. In June, at its annual convention in
New Orleans, the ALA revoked the Israeli censorship resolution.
"ADL did not engage in any form of pressure or intimidation ...,"
said Kenneth Jacobson, the ADL's director of international affairs.
"We recognize and respect the First Amendment rights of Israel's
critics in this country and fully exercise our own free speech
rights. There is nothing illegal, improper, or clandestine about our
efforts and nothing merits our apology."
[end]
The Washington Times
October 19, 1993
page A13
Loudoun Investigator's Mission: An Expenses-Paid Trip to Israel
by Robert O'Harrow, Jr.
For much of his career, Donald Moore was an investigator with
the Loudoun County sheriff's department. He loved undercover
surveillance, and sometimes went through trash dumpsters in a
furtive search for clues.
For eight days in May 1991, More became a police emissary of
sorts on an all-expenses paid "mission" to Israel sponsored by
the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) of B'nai B'rith. He and 11 other
American officers, including some from the District and
Montgomery County, received a military briefing and shared ideas
with national police leaders.
Two years later, the trip and other ADL-sponsored missions came
under scrutiny by the San Francisco District Attorney's office,
which has been examining whether the ADL granted favors to peace
officers to encourage them to share confidential police
information with the organization.
One officer who went along on Moore's trip, former San
Francisco inspector Thomas Gerard, has pleaded not guilty to
felony charges that he passed along police information to
longtime ADL operative Roy H. Bullock.
Authorities say Moore and the other officers on the May 1991
trip are not targets of the investigation; at least three of the
officers have been interviewed by the FBI or police authorities
in California.
Bullock has said the ADL had "numerous peace officers"
supplying confidential criminal records and other information,
court records show. Some civil rights groups and privacy rights
experts say they fear the ADL, and possibly other private groups,
quietly have supplemented police intelligence-gathering by doing
investigative work off limits to police.
"That is a real question that we have, not only in San
Francisco, but also in other communities," said John Crew, an
American Civil Liberties Union attorney.
ADL officials acknowledge they have worked closely with law
enforcement on investigating bias crimes, police training, and
drafting hate crimes legislation. But they say such cooperation
is part of the organization's civic duty and deny knowingly
accepting illegal information. "There's nothing that we do that
is sinister and there's nothing that we do that is against the
law," said Abraham H. Foxman, ADL's national director.
Moore and other officers say they often have turned to the ADL
for help, but not to the point of sharing restricted information.
Moore was fired last year in an unrelated incident after
sheriff's officials said he was found going through private phone
messages. He was acquitted last year of charges that he helped
plan an abduction of Lewis du Pont Smith, an heir to the du Pont
fortune and a longtime follower of political extremist Lyndon H.
LaRouche Jr.
It was his investigation of LaRouche that brought Moore into
close contact with the ADL. In 1986, he was assigned to
investigate LaRouche followers after the group moved its
headquarters to Leesburg in Loudoun County.
Working as a local point man in an investigation that
eventually involved federal agents in several cities, Moore set
up a computer database in Leesburg listing LaRouche associates
and cultivated local residents to help track their movements.
Moore began working with ADL fact finder Mira Boland, who
joined the ADL in 1982 and was assigned to cultivate law
enforcement sources. Boland is now widely known among police as a
source of reliable tips, sometimes from "snitches" who infiltrate
hate groups. Boland declined repeated requests to be interviewed,
saying ADL leaders denied her permission.
Beginning in 1986, court records show, Boland said she began
sharing information on LaRouche with Moore and other Loudoun
sheriff's deputies. The two regularly exchanged details about
LaRouche, including clips from his groups' publications and
county gun permit records.
When LaRouche was convicted of conspiracy and mail fraud in
1988 in Alexandria, the ADL celebrated with prosecutors, Moore
and others involved in the case. Boland has a photo of the
celebration in her office.
Transcripts of a recent federal wiretap of Moore's telephone on
an unrelated case describe his relationship with the ADL. "I need
to find a guy the ADL had a little old woman knocking on his
apartment in New York two hours after I had asked," Moore said on
the recording, court papers show. "I told the feds exactly where,
when and how to get him. And he was got."
Moore said in an interview that he has never passed along
restricted records to the ADL. "Did I share any information with
them? Nothing that wasn't public information," he said.
Despite questions raised by investigators about ADL's tactics,
Washington area police agencies praise the group. They say
Boland's fact-finding office in the District and the publications
it produces are helpful in researching extremist groups.
In Maryland, the District and Virginia, for instance, police
are not allowed to create files on individuals or groups solely
because of their political or racial views. The ADL has no such
restraints, police say. ADL officials say fact finders such as
Boland work in the same ways as journalists.
"In one way, it's like another law enforcement agency," said
Lt. Tim Boyle, of the Maryland-National Capital Park Police in
Montgomery, who went on the 1991 ADL trip to Israel. "They can
tell you who the leaders are, when they started, that type of
thing. They have no restrictions on them."
Boyle turned to the ADL in 1989 when a teenager of Asian
descent was taunted as a "gook" and attacked with steel-toed
boots by a gang of Skinheads.
When one of the gang leaders disappeared, the ADL offered to
use its sources to help find him, Boyle said. Eventually, using a
young undercover operative, the ADL infiltrated the Skinheads and
found the suspect, who was arrested in Pittsburgh.
Much of the ADL's work with law enforcement goes beyond
investigations. In New Jersey, the ADL helped the state attorney
general's office produce a hate-crime training video, now
circulated to some 700 police agencies across the country. The
ADL also helps police draft legislation to curb hate crimes.
The ADL views its special police missions to Israel as another
intensive training activity, giving officers a chance to meet
with top Israeli police, intelligence officers and political
leaders.
"They have been our unofficial consultant," said James
Mulvihill, a New Jersey assistant attorney general who speaks
with ADL officials on an almost weekly basis. "I regard them as
the premier prejudice fighting organization.
[end]