Consider first the case of an Israeli named Ami Popper. In May 1990, two years after the original publication of this book, Popper put on his army uniform and asked men waiting at a bus stop in a southern Israeli town for their identity cards. After confirming they were Arabs he lined them up and opened fire, killing seven. Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir immediately declared that the killings had no political significance, but were instead the act of a "deranged individual." Popper, however, was found sane and fit to stand trial. He is now serving a long prison sentence for murder and recently married the adopted daughter of Rabbi Meir Kahane's son, Benjamin Kahane, leader of the Kahane Chai (Kahane Lives) movement. Popper's sentence is the subject of regular appeals by settlers and other Jewish fundamentalists who demand his release as a "political prisoner."
Approximately six years later, on February 28, 1994, Dr. Baruch Goldstein woke up early in Kiryat Arba, an Israeli settlement on the West Bank near the ancient Jewish town and contemporary Palestinian Arab city of Hebron. Goldstein was an American Jewish immigrant to Israel also affiliated to Meir Kahane's organization. The previous day he had meticulously updated his patients' files and composed a farewell note to his coworkers thanking them for the opportunity to work with them toward the fulfillment of the "complete redemption." He donned his army uniform, picked up his assault rifle and several clips of ammunition, and went to the Tomb of the Patriarchs in the center of Hebron, where Abraham (Ibrahim to Muslims) is believed buried.
With a marksman's headset protecting his ears Goldstein brushed aside the unarmed Arab guard and entered the portion of the site reserved as a mosque. The room was packed with Muslims reciting their prayers for the holy month of Ramadan. Goldstein pointed his gun and began killing the kneeling men and boys. When his gun jammed he was beaten to death by desperate survivors, but not before he had shot twenty-nine people to death, wounded dozens more, and unleashed a torrent of violence that seriously jeopardized the budding peace process