Final_Judgment

[128] Final Judgment 189
According to Roemer, it was Lansky who sent Dalitz to Las Vegas to
inquire into the activities of Ben Siegel. Dalitz, reports Roemer, "was the
main contributor to the growing opinion that everything was not on the up
and up. His report was the major reason why Lansky, [Frank] Costello, et
al, made their report to the [organized crime] assembly in Havana in
December 1946 and later in June when it was finally decided to chop
Bugsy." 345
In Chapter 13 we shall review the Lansky-Siegel connection further and
examine the bizarre role that the colorful thug, Mickey Cohen, Siegel's
successor as Lansky's West Coast henchman, played in Israel's intrigues
against JFK and in the JFK assassination conspiracy.
In fact, as a direct consequence of Seigel's assassination, Dalitz stepped
in as Lansky's official liaison in Las Vegas, becoming the so-called
"godfather of Las Vegas." However, it would be nearly thirty years later that
Robert Blakey, the chief proponent of the theory that "The Mafia Killed
JFK" would end up on Morris Dalitz's team, proclaiming Dalitz innocent of
any mob connections and directing attention away from any direct Lansky
connections to the JFK assassination conspiracy.
Unfortunately for Blakey, Dalitz and La Costa, Penthouse prevailed and
beat back their libel suit and, in effect, repudiated Blakey's character
reference on behalf of Dalitz and his associates.
So it was that the chief proponent of the theory that "the Mafia Killed
JFK" had lined up in defense of one of Meyer Lansky's closest associates—
Moe Dalitz, a legendary figure in the underworld himself.
Some seven months after Blakey and the House Assassinations
Committee issued their report that "The Mafia Killed JFK"—a report that
carefully and studiously ignored Lansky's high-level influence over "the
Mafia"—the Wall Street Journal reported in September of 1979 that Dalitz
had long been identified by federal authorities as an ongoing senior advisor to
organized crime. 346 This time Dalitz did not bring a libel suit.
ISRAEL HONORS DALITZ
Dalitz' public image, however, did not suffer as a consequence of the
Penthouse victory in the libel suit or as a result of the report in the Wall
Street Journal. Instead, in 1983 the aging mob figure and Las Vegas
"philanthropist" was honored by the pro-Israel Anti-Defamation League
(ADL) of B'nai B'rith with its prestigious "Torch of Liberty Award."
Evidently the ADL did not see any problem with giving its highest
honor to one of the top leaders of organized crime. Dalitz's service to the
cause of Israel was apparently deemed more significant than his activities in
the underworld. And Dalitz was indeed an active supporter of Israel's cause.
In fact, Dalitz himself was the key mid-West contact for the Sonneborn
Institute—the Israeli arms smuggling entity—that we first encountered in
Chapter 7 where we examined the long-standing ties of the Lansky
Syndicate to Israel. So we can certainly understand why the ADL would be
so eager to award Dalitz for his services.