Local News in Brief : Garden Grove : Backers of Palestinians, Israel Protest at Church

About 100 Palestinian supporters held a candlelight protest in front of the Crystal Cathedral on Thursday night as a dozen members of the Jewish Defense League held up their own signs and taunted the Palestinians with racial slurs from across Lewis Avenue.

Plainclothes police officers were present, but there were no incidents during the 90-minute demonstration.

Sami Odeh, brother of Alex M. Odeh, the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee regional director killed by a bomb at his Santa Ana office in 1985, said the Palestinian group was demonstrating to “show our outrage” over recent violence in the Israeli-occupied Gaza Strip and the West Bank.

“We are hoping to bring some awareness to our American friends,” said Odeh, explaining why the group was holding its demonstration at the Crystal Cathedral. Hundreds of cars rolled by the demonstrators on their way into the huge church parking lot for Christmas Eve services.

Irv Rubin, chairman of the Jewish Defense League, said his group came to the church “because wherever they (the Palestinians) go, we’ve got to show up. . . . There has to be a Jewish presence.”

Several of the JDL demonstrators shouted racial epithets at the Palestinians, but Palestinian organizers urged their crowd--which included small children, students and elderly people--not to answer.