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Entering March of 1973, President Richard Nixon was facing serious accusations of criminal activity. Having just been reelected a year previous and pushing for a complete withdrawal from Vietnam, Nixon was losing support on all sides. The country was distrustful of the government already at this point and Nixon was desperate to cover up the activities of Watergate. On March Seventh, 1973, on the day of the visit of Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir's visit to New York City, a tragedy occurred. Unbeknownst to the authorities, Khalid Duhhum Al-Jawary, a Palestinian member of the militant terrorist organization Black September, had rented three mid sized sedans, and packed each of them with highly flammable explosives. The first explosion occurred at JFK International Airport at, the Israeli airline, El Al Israel's cargo terminal. The blast was huge and killed 64 people immediately. The damage to the terminal was horrific and many people inside would later succumb to their injuries. The blast occurred at roughly 1:00 PM EST. Police and firefighters rushed to the scene, as New Yorkers were alerted to the horrific scene. However, two hours later, a second car bomb exploded, though not nearly as terrible as the first. This car was parked on 5th Avenue and 43rd Street, in front of an Israel Discount Bank. The bank, whose employees had closed up after the horrific attack on JFK, were not present but the bomb dealer significant damage to the building itself as well as killing 17 people on the sidewalk and an additional 20 in the 100 yard radius. The second attack caused the NYPD to put an APB out on all cars left parked in front of Jewish businesses. Katz's Deli, the famous deli in New York's Lower East Side was checked rigorously along with the many synagogues. Finally around 7 that night, NYPD officer Jeremy Dawes, found a car parked in front of the First Israel Bank and Trust company at 5th Avenue and 47th street. The car had been looked over twice previously but the Hebrew newspapers in the seat passenger had caused the police to consider it an unlikely part of the plot. Officer Dawes was suspicious enough to ask for the bomb squad to be called in. At Eight O'clock, the bomb squad arrived. The squad immediately found the explosives, but as they removed them, the explosives erupted killing the bomb squad, Officer Dawes and 39 people surrounding the car, including 15 police officers. By the next day the death toll in New York had reached 187.

The entire population of the United States became incensed. Claims were flying everywhere. It was the Viet Cong, it was the Soviets, the protestors, the Weathermen, the Black Panthers. Finger pointing and posturing by politicians became common place over the following week. Nixon, in an emergency broadcast to the nations offered his support to the families of the victims and released the information to the public that the perpetrators of the New York bombings were not radicals, communists or minorities, but the Palestinian Black September group. The culprit was obvious. Each bomb had been placed with large amounts of Black September propaganda hidden inside of Hebrew language newspapers. When the bombs exploded so did the propaganda and as a result each site had been littered with Arabic leaflets. The Black September group had first come to light in their involvement in the Munich Massacre of the Israeli athletes during the Summer Olympics in 1972. The US public soon became incensed at the Palestinians and, conveniently for Nixon, seemingly forgot about the accusations against Nixon. It was only in 1996, two years after Nixon's death that the files proving Nixon's involvement with the Watergate burglaries, were released to the public. Nixon would visit New York a week later, visiting grieving New Yorkers and "daring the enemies of freedom to challenge him", according to one New York Times opinion article.

The visit to New York City and his speech to the United Nations Assembly challenging terrorism in all of its forms, boosted Nixon's approval rating to 86%, with only his hardest critics still accusing him of any misdeed. It was in part due to Nixon's pledge to the leaders of the world to "fight and win this new war on terror". This was the beginning of a new era of politics in the United States. It birthed an even closer relationship in Israel and by the end of the Nixon Presidency in 1976, the first US troops were out of Vietnam, and in the Middle East.

To be continued....
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