Rabbi Meir Kahane

About 30 Jewish and Arab demonstrators exchanged angry words and punches outside a Manhattan courthouse as jury selection began for the trial of El Sayyid Nosair, accused of killing the militant Rabbi Meir Kahane. Police arrested one Nosair supporter. Nosair, 35, an Egyptian-born naturalized U.S. citizen, has pleaded not guilty to charges of murder, attempted murder, assault, criminal possession of a weapon and unlawful imprisonment. He has been held without bail since his arrest on Nov.

Israeli police jailed a Jewish settler after finding a large quantity of illegal explosives and ammunition in his West Bank home along with pamphlets of Rabbi Meir Kahane's militant Kach Party, Israel radio said Friday. Police suspect followers of Kahane helped collect the explosives, the radio said. Kahane, an American-born rabbi elected last year to Parliament, advocates the removal of Arabs from the Jewish state.

Militant Rabbi Meir Kahane, a member of Parliament, will be prosecuted for sending letters to Arab citizens asking them to leave the country, Israeli Atty. Gen. Yosef Harish's office announced. Parliament denied Kahane his mail privileges last year when then-Communications Minister Amnon Rubenstein discovered he was using official stationery to send hate letters to Arabs at the state's expense. "It was a pretty shocking letter that was sent from the Parliament," Rubenstein said.

A congressman said that FBI agents had warned him his name was on a list found at the home of the man charged with killing militant Rabbi Meir Kahane. Rep. Gary L. Ackerman (D-N.Y.) said FBI officials also told him it could mean he was a possible target of terrorists. The existence of the list of five New York leaders was reported in New York Newsday. The list also included two federal judges, a former assistant U.S. attorney and a columnist for the weekly Jewish Press.

A protester dumped blood-like red dye from a plastic bag onto Rabbi Meir Kahane, anti-Arab extremist member of the Israeli Knesset, today as he was addressing a news conference with a call to expel all Arabs from Israeli held territory. Police arrested Daniel Brown, 26, of Washington and charged him with simple assault. The protester left behind a typewritten statement signed "Jews Against Zionism."

Israeli supporters of extremist Rabbi Meir Kahane set fire to the office of a socialist newspaper in Haifa, police said. Two young activists in Kahane's Kach party were arrested shortly after setting the blaze, police spokesman Dov Lutzki said. "There is little doubt that their motives were political," Lutzki said. The U.S.-born Kahane has accused the media of being leftist and has threatened "to take care of all the journalists" if he ever attains power.

Militant Rabbi Meir Kahane finally got a chance to speak at USC on Monday, to a group of about 65 people, while protesters outside compared him to Adolf Hitler because of his controversial plan to expel Arabs from all Israeli-held territories. Kahane, the American-born leader of Israel's nationalistic Kach movement, had first been scheduled to speak on campus last November. But USC officials cancelled the visit, fearing his presence could incite violence.

A judge, disclosing that he had been threatened, today revoked $300,000 bail for the man accused of killing Rabbi Meir Kahane at a Manhattan hotel on Nov. 5. State Supreme Court Justice Alvin Schlesinger believed that there was a strong likelihood that El Sayyid Nosair, 35, a native of Egypt, would flee. Among Schlesinger's reasons was a passport Nosair held in a different name.

The man accused of assassinating Rabbi Meir Kahane may have been taking an antidepressant drug that critics claim induces violent behavior, a published report said. The New York Times in today's editions quoted an unnamed law enforcement source as saying that the accused, El Sayyid Nosair, was taking Prozac. Several lawsuits are pending against the drug's manufacturer, Eli Lilly & Co., which has denied allegations that the drug can induce suicidal or homicidal behavior.