Last wee, members of the Pasadena Jewish Temple and Center gathered to remember the devastating wildfire that burned down the synagogue’s campus and much of the surrounding community of Altadena one year ago.On Sunday, they felt another kind of grief when a member of the congregation drove by the site and discovered anti-Zionist graffiti scrawled on an exterior wall, synagogue leaders said Monday.In addition to denouncing Zionism, the graffiti said, “RIP Renee,” which Rabbi Ratner took as a reference to Renee Good, the woman who was shot and killed by a federal agent in Minneapolis last week. Rabbi Ratner said that he had mentioned Ms. Good, whose death he described as a tragedy, in the congregation’s recent prayer for the dead.Photos of the graffiti viewed by The New York Times showed that the message was written in large letters across several feet of a white exterior wall of the campus, which is otherwise surrounded by a chain-link fence covered with green hedges. Congregation members said that there is no signage identifying the site as a synagogue or other Jewish community center.In an email to temple members, Rabbi Ratner described the graffiti as “hateful and antisemitic.” He said that the temple was working with law enforcement agencies and Jewish organizations to investigate the episode and ensure the community’s safety.
It is nice that the story was covered, but there are no photos of the graffiti so we can determine exactly what it said. Merely calling it "anti-Zionist" is a cop-out, especially when the rabbi calls it "hateful and antisemitic." Did it compare Israel to Nazis? Did it say "we disagree with the Likud"? This all makes a difference, but the NYT is almost certainly sanitizing what it actually said, because it probably mirrored sentiments that have been published in that newspaper over the past two years.
Based on the description in the article, it appears that the graffiti was scrawled on the low white wall at the former location of the synagogue.
The houses across the street appear untouched by the fire. Those residents would have seen the graffiti but it was only reported by a congregation member who drove by the location.
The far-Left are attacking synagogues as much as the far-Right are. Yet the outrage for the former is certainly more muted.
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"He's an Anti-Zionist Too!" cartoon book (December 2024) PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism (February 2022) |
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