Rabbi Israel Dresner, Civil Rights Champion and King Ally, Dies at 92
Sam Roberts of The New York Times reports, “Israel S. Dresner, a New Jersey rabbi who ventured into the Deep South in the 1960s to champion civil rights, befriended the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and was jailed multiple times for demonstrating against racial segregation, died on Jan. 13 in Wayne, N.J. He was 92.” Dresner melded his faith with social justice, protesting on behalf of the oppressed from South Africa to Vietnam. Last year, he said to WCBS-TV in New York, “I want to be remembered as somebody who not only tried to keep the Jewish faith but to invoke the Jewish doctrine from the Talmud, which is called ‘tikkun olam’ — repairing the world — and I hope that I made a little bit of a contribution to making the world a little better place.”