Kahanism is an extreme right-wing Zionist fringe movement, named after one of its major proponents, the Rabbi Meir Kahane. The major premise of Kahanism is that the Arabs seek to exterminate the Jews, and that a Greater Israel, ethnically cleansed of Arabs, should be created in at minimum present-day Israel plus the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Some Kahanists also argue that such a greater Israel should be ruled according to theocratic law, or include presently-Jordanian territory on the East Bank of the Jordan River.
The State of Israel has outlawed groups espousing Kahane's ideology, and forbids their participating in the Israeli government.
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The deadliest Kahanist terrorist attack was Baruch Goldstein's massacre at the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron, in 1994, in which 29 Palestinians were gunned down. After this attack the Kahanist group Kach was banned in Israel. Kahanists have also carried out roadside shootings, stabbings and grenade attacks against Palestinians in Jerusalem and the West Bank. They never claim responsibility for these attacks under the Kach name, but rather under a variety of aliases including 'The Committee for the Safety of the Roads', 'The Sword of David', 'The Repression of Traitors', 'The Judean Legion' and 'The Yeshiva of the Jewish Idea'.
In 1980 the Machteret, a group linked to Kach, unsuccessfully attempted to assassinate several Palestinian mayors, and plotted to blow up the Al-Aqsa Mosque, which is built on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, before being broken up.
The main Kahanist group in the United States is the Jewish Defense League. The JDL started out as a vigilante organization to protect New York City's Orthodox Jewish communities from attacks by black street thugs. As a result, American Kahanism is characterized by a strong hostility not only against Arabs and Muslims, but also against Blacks and immigrants. This is especially marked among the "Jewish Task Force" - a JDL splinter group which claims to aim to "save America and Israel from the Third World hordes."Kahanist Terrorism in the Middle East
Kahanism in the United States
