{"id":67979,"date":"2022-06-07T06:55:53","date_gmt":"2022-06-07T11:55:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/?p=67979"},"modified":"2022-06-07T06:56:20","modified_gmt":"2022-06-07T11:56:20","slug":"before-wwii-jewish-mobsters-kept-nazis-at-bay-in-the-us-with-their-fists","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/before-wwii-jewish-mobsters-kept-nazis-at-bay-in-the-us-with-their-fists\/","title":{"rendered":"Before WWII, Jewish mobsters kept Nazis at bay in the US \u2014 with their fists"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>By HOWARD LOVY<\/p>\n<p>(JTA) \u2014 The way author Michael Benson tells it, one day in 1938, New York judge and Jewish communal leader Nathan Perlman sat at a bar and thought, \u201cHow come these Nazis get to march down 86th Street, goose-stepping and \u2018sieg heiling\u2019 like it\u2019s the Macy\u2019s Parade? Why are they so brazen?\u201d<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_67980\" style=\"width: 310px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/5-24-22-Meyer-Landsy-scaled.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-67980\" class=\"wp-image-67980 size-medium lazyload\" data-src=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/5-24-22-Meyer-Landsy-300x242.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"242\" data-srcset=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/5-24-22-Meyer-Landsy-300x242.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/5-24-22-Meyer-Landsy-1024x827.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/5-24-22-Meyer-Landsy-768x620.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/5-24-22-Meyer-Landsy-1536x1240.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/5-24-22-Meyer-Landsy-2048x1654.jpg 2048w\" data-sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" src=\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAAAACH5BAEKAAEALAAAAAABAAEAAAICTAEAOw==\" style=\"--smush-placeholder-width: 300px; --smush-placeholder-aspect-ratio: 300\/242;\" \/><noscript><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-67980\" class=\"wp-image-67980 size-medium\" src=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/5-24-22-Meyer-Landsy-300x242.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"242\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/5-24-22-Meyer-Landsy-300x242.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/5-24-22-Meyer-Landsy-1024x827.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/5-24-22-Meyer-Landsy-768x620.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/5-24-22-Meyer-Landsy-1536x1240.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/5-24-22-Meyer-Landsy-2048x1654.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/noscript><\/a><\/p>\n<p id=\"caption-attachment-67980\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Meyer Lansky, bottom right, lent his services to Jewish leaders looking to counter the American Nazi movement. (Getty Images)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>It was because they were not worried about the consequences. Too few people in then-isolationist America really cared about what was being said about the Jews or what was happening to them in Europe, Benson said. What was needed, then, were Jews who weren\u2019t afraid to break some laws \u2014 and some bones \u2014 as they challenged the homegrown Nazi threat.<\/p>\n<p>And that\u2019s when, in Benson\u2019s words, \u201cJudge Perlman thought outside the box.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>What happened next is the subject of Benson\u2019s book, \u201cGangsters Vs. Nazis: How Jewish Mobsters Battled Nazis in Wartime America\u201d (Kensington), published in late April. As the title suggests, Perlman had a few connections in the underworld. That included Meyer Lansky, an accountant, bootlegger and fixer whose work straddled both the Italian American and the Jewish mob. Lansky, in turn, had at his disposal Jewish members of a mob enforcement organization known as \u201cMurder Inc.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The Jewish mobsters showed up to intimidate and fight the the German American Bund and other Nazi organizations from New York to Chicago to Minnesota and even Los Angeles. It got to the point, Benson said, when Nazis began to stay away from rallies because they knew they would be in for it.<\/p>\n<p>Lansky was happy to help and accepted no pay for the service. \u201cI am a Jew, and I feel for the Jews in Europe who are suffering. They are my brothers,\u201d Benson quotes Lansky as saying.<\/p>\n<p>Despite the syndicate\u2019s name, said Benson, \u201cNo one gets killed in the entire book.\u201d It wasn\u2019t that Lansky didn\u2019t relish the thought of killing Nazis. But Rabbi Stephen Wise, the Reform rabbi and Zionist leader whom Perlman brought along to a meeting with Lansky, insisted on no deaths. While Jewish members of Murder Inc. cracked a few skulls during the course of 1938, the year covered in the book, they didn\u2019t kill any Nazi sympathizers.<\/p>\n<p>This is all familiar territory for Benson, who specializes in books about the Mafia and true crime. His interest in crime and killers dates back to his childhood, growing up near Rochester, New York. When he was nine years old, his babysitter and her friend were murdered, a cold case that he said he later cracked as an adult \u2014 a story he tells in the 2015 book \u201cThe Devil at Genesee Junction.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI started out writing about psycho killers and grisly murders,\u201d Benson told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. \u201cAnd for the last few years, I\u2019ve been the Mafia writer for Kensington Books. So, I knew the cast of characters and I think that\u2019s why they brought me in.\u201d<br \/>\nBenson is not Jewish \u2014 he describes himself as a \u201clapsed Catholic\u201d \u2014 but says he has a deep understanding of antisemitism. He went to Hofstra University in New York, which he described as \u201c80% Jewish.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI understand hate,\u201d he said. \u201cWhen my first child was about to be born, I was walking my very, very pregnant wife to Beth Israel [Medical Center] in Manhattan, and we were egged by kids in a van, who shouted the \u2018K-word\u2019 at us. I understand antisemitism, prejudice, and hateful thinking.\u201d<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_67981\" style=\"width: 1034px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/5-24-22-American-Nazis-scaled.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-67981\" class=\"wp-image-67981 size-large lazyload\" data-src=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/5-24-22-American-Nazis-1024x612.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1024\" height=\"612\" data-srcset=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/5-24-22-American-Nazis-1024x612.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/5-24-22-American-Nazis-300x179.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/5-24-22-American-Nazis-768x459.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/5-24-22-American-Nazis-1536x917.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/5-24-22-American-Nazis-2048x1223.jpg 2048w\" data-sizes=\"(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" src=\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAAAACH5BAEKAAEALAAAAAABAAEAAAICTAEAOw==\" style=\"--smush-placeholder-width: 1024px; --smush-placeholder-aspect-ratio: 1024\/612;\" \/><noscript><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-67981\" class=\"wp-image-67981 size-large\" src=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/5-24-22-American-Nazis-1024x612.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1024\" height=\"612\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/5-24-22-American-Nazis-1024x612.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/5-24-22-American-Nazis-300x179.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/5-24-22-American-Nazis-768x459.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/5-24-22-American-Nazis-1536x917.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/5-24-22-American-Nazis-2048x1223.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/noscript><\/a><\/p>\n<p id=\"caption-attachment-67981\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Members of the German-American Bund parading through the streets of New York City in 1938. (Three Lions\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>In Benson\u2019s book, the main villains \u2014 the embodiment of hateful thinking \u2014 were members of the German American Bund. By 1938, what began as an organization to celebrate German-American heritage had been taken over by Fritz Julius Kuhn, who worshiped Hitler and attempted to imitate his speaking style.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHe\u2019s as much like Hitler as he could possibly be, waives his arms, spittle spews when he talks, and he harps again, again, again, on how the Jews are responsible for all the world\u2019s problems, and that\u2019s why everybody\u2019s poor these days,\u201d Benson said. \u201cAnd it\u2019s a message that resonates.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>That\u2019s when Lansky had his boys take matters into their own hands. There are a series of brawls \u2014 a big one in the Bund\u2019s home turf of Yorkville in Manhattan \u2014 and the Bund is shown just how tough Jews can be.<\/p>\n<p>In Benson\u2019s book, everything comes to a head in an infamous 1939 Madison Square Garden pro-Nazi event, which the author calls \u201cThe Bund\u2019s Last Gasp.\u201d It was a hate rally led by Kuhn. But the American Hitler wannabe was upstaged by a Jewish plumber from Williamsburg named Isadore Greenbaum, who jumped onstage, pulled the plug on Kuhn\u2019s microphone in the middle of his speech, and was roughed up by Kuhn\u2019s bodyguards. \u201cWhen I heard persecution against my religion, I lost my head,\u201d Greenbaum later said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAnd the next day, all of the newspapers that were supposed to say what a great rally it was talked about the one hero who busted it up,\u201d Benson said.<\/p>\n<p>This is very much a story of its time. Mobsters showing restraint against killing doesn\u2019t seem very plausible in today\u2019s world. But, Benson said, the threat to Jews remains.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe forces of evil that the Jewish gangsters were fighting are with us today and scary as ever,\u201d he said. \u201cWho\u2019s going to be Captain America? Who\u2019s going to be the Judge Perlman and Meyer Lansky?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Antisemites are small in number, Benson said, but they are just as brazen in their hatred as were the American Nazis in 1938. What\u2019s the solution? Well, Perlman and Lansky may have used crude methods, but they succeeded in shaming the Bund.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI don\u2019t really want to advocate violence,\u201d Benson said, \u201cbut it seems about time that all of society should subject them to the same level of embarrassment and shame and stigma if they behave in this way.\u201d<\/p>\n<div style=\"padding-bottom:20px; padding-top:10px;\" class=\"hupso-share-buttons\"><!-- Hupso Share Buttons - https:\/\/www.hupso.com\/share\/ --><a class=\"hupso_toolbar\" href=\"https:\/\/www.hupso.com\/share\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" data-src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/buttons\/share-medium.png\" style=\"border:0px; padding-top: 5px; float:left;\" alt=\"Share Button\" src=\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAAAACH5BAEKAAEALAAAAAABAAEAAAICTAEAOw==\" class=\"lazyload\" \/><noscript><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/buttons\/share-medium.png\" style=\"border:0px; padding-top: 5px; float:left;\" alt=\"Share Button\"\/><\/noscript><\/a><script type=\"text\/javascript\">var hupso_services_t=new Array(\"Twitter\",\"Facebook\",\"Google Plus\",\"Pinterest\",\"Linkedin\",\"Tumblr\",\"Email\");var hupso_background_t=\"#EAF4FF\";var hupso_border_t=\"#66CCFF\";var hupso_toolbar_size_t=\"medium\";var hupso_image_folder_url = \"\";var hupso_url_t=\"\";var hupso_title_t=\"Before%20WWII%2C%20Jewish%20mobsters%20kept%20Nazis%20at%20bay%20in%20the%20US%20%E2%80%94%20with%20their%20fists\";<\/script><script type=\"text\/javascript\" src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/js\/share_toolbar.js\"><\/script><!-- Hupso Share Buttons --><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":67980,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7135,3],"tags":[12342,8790,8795,12341,8788],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67979"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=67979"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67979\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":67982,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67979\/revisions\/67982"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/67980"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=67979"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=67979"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=67979"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}