JEWISH POLICY CENTER
Robert Kennedy in Palestine, 1948
Lenny Ben-David
Spring 2023

In April 1948, one month before Israel declared independence, Robert Kennedy, then 22 and a recent Harvard graduate, traveled to Palestine to report on the conflict for the Boston Post. His four dispatches from the scene were published in June 1948…Sirhan Sirhan, RFK’s assassin, chose the first anniversary of the Six Day War to kill the Democratic candidate. At his trial and in his diary, the Arab Christian complained about Kennedy’s support for Israel in 1948 and again during the 1968 campaign. Specifically, Sirhan pointed to a May campaign speech in a Portland, Oregon synagogue where RFK urged the US government to provide Israel with advanced F-4 Phantom jets. READ MORE