CovOps
 Location : Ether-Sphere
Job/hobbies : Irrationality Exterminator
Humor : Über Serious
 |  Subject: The People Have Spoken: Kentucky sees record level of antisemitic incidents  Wed Apr 28, 2021 3:51 am | |
| LOUISVILLE, Ky. — More antisemitic incidents were reported in Kentucky last year than in any year since the Anti-Defamation League began keeping track more than 40 years ago, according to data the group released Tuesday.
There were 19 antisemitic incidents in the Bluegrass State last year, up from the two such incidents in 2019 and higher than the state's annual average of roughly four antisemitic incidents, the New York-based group said.
“In 2020, Jews across Kentucky had to combat two out-of-control viruses — the coronavirus and the virus of hate,” said James Pasch, the regional director of the league's Cleveland Regional Office, which serves Kentucky as well as Ohio, West Virginia and western Pennsylvania. "Despite coronavirus pandemic restrictions, antisemites still found ways to express their anti-Jewish hate. In fact, the pandemic inspired new antisemitic ideas and tactics such as Zoombombing, proving that bigots remain emboldened to act on their hateful ideologies.
"This problem is not going to disappear unless we act now to curb anti-Jewish hate in Kentucky and across the nation."
Pasch also told The Courier Journal the rise in antisemitic incidents should concern all Americans because "when there is hate toward one minority group, there is hate toward other minority groups," such as those in the Black, Asian American and Pacific Islander communities.
The 2020 numbers, Pasch added, are "not a totality of the circumstances on the ground."
"It’s a snapshot in time," Pasch said. "And we don’t need to look at the statistics to know that we’re trending in the wrong direction because we feel it in the environment."
The group's "Audit of Antisemitic Incidents" for 2020 includes both criminal and noncriminal acts of harassment and intimidation, including distribution of hate propaganda, threats and slurs.
The group, which began keeping track of such incidents in 1979, counts instances in which individuals reported having been the direct targets of online antisemitic harassment, including on social media.
The audit does not include antisemitic rhetoric without a specific target, which the league's Center on Technology and Society works to track and expose alongside other forms of online hate.
In Kentucky:Libertarian Party compares 'vaccine passports' to stars Jews wore in Holocaust
The audit classifies incidents into three categories: harassment, vandalism and assault.
Here is a breakdown of the incidents reported last year in Kentucky:
12 harassment cases: The Anti-Defamation League defines harassment as cases in which "Jews reported feeling targeted or threatened by antisemitic language or acts."
Six acts of vandalism: The league defines vandalism as "cases in which property was damaged in a manner that harmed or intimidated Jews." For comparison, no such incidents were reported in 2019.
One assault:The league defines assaults as "cases in which individuals were physically targeted with violence accompanied by evidence of antisemitic animus." There was also one assault case in 2019.
Of the 19 incidents recorded across Kentucky in 2020, 10 occurred in Louisville, per the league's audit.
Four incidents occurred in Lexington. And moving into this year, the "ADL H.E.A.T. Map" has reported 11 more incidents in Louisville and seven in Lexington.
In Louisville, the reported antisemitic incidents included a case last June in which stickers were found in the Highlands featuring the antisemitic "Happy Merchant" cartoon with a message that read, "It's the Jews!"
Last April, a Louisville synagogue's virtual prayer services held via Zoom were disrupted by an unknown person who shared "antisemitic, pornographic and racist virtual content," the audit found.
Last March, a Holocaust educator in Louisville received an "antisemitic and Holocaust denial email," per the league.
And last February, a Jewish woman in Louisville discovered someone had spray-painted "Jew" on her trash cans.
Matthew Goldberg, the Jewish Federation of Louisville's director of community relations, said he was not surprised by the new data, as he has reported antisemitic incidents to the league.
“It’s still a shock to the system and distressing to see such a massive increase in Kentucky,” Goldberg said. “I really do hope it serves as a wake-up call to Kentucky that we have a real problem with hate in the state, and not just with antisemitism.”
The other antisemitic incidents reported last year included a December attack in Lexington in which a driver yelling antisemitic slurs hit a member of the Chabad of the Bluegrass during a menorah lighting ceremony by the University of Kentucky's campus.
The injured member, who was helping light the menorah for the third night of Hanukkah, was hospitalized.
In October, a high school student in Murray was bullied by peers who called her "Christ killer" and said "Heil Hitler," among other antisemitic comments, according to the league's audit.
More:Kentucky first state to adopt Holocaust remembrance group's anti-Semitism definition
The Anti-Defamation League said extremist groups or individuals inspired by extremist ideology were responsible for six of last year's incidents, including several in Louisville.
In August, the group also reported a white supremacist group named "14first" had distributed propaganda in the central Kentucky city of Versailles.
Another antisemitic incident was reported in Northern Kentucky in July when a person in Hebron used a "derogatory reference about Jews during a business dispute," the league said.
And in Elizabethtown last May, the league said "Hundred Handers," an "international white supremacist sticker producer," distributed stickers that read: "If you only knew how much better things could be," "ANTIFA useful idiots for global capitalism," "Anti-Semitism is caused by Semitism" and "Have you noticed?"
The league's Cleveland Regional Office saw a 114% increase in antisemitic activity last year, one of the highest increases of any region across the country, per the organization.
In 2020, it recorded 77 incidents in the region, the highest level of the last decade, including the 19 incidents in Kentucky, 43 in Ohio, four in West Virginia and 11 in western Pennsylvania.
The regional antisemitic incidents mirrored national trends, according to the data, which showed 2,024 total reported incidents in the country in 2020, a continuation of "historically high levels" of antisemitic cases.
That national figure was a 4% dip from an "all-time high" in 2019, but the audit said 2020 was still the third-highest year for incidents against American Jews on record.
Antisemitic incidents were reported in every state except Hawaii, North Dakota and Wyoming, with the audit finding an average of nearly six antisemitic incidents in the U.S. for every day last year.
Tuesday also marked the two-year anniversary of the shooting at a synagogue in Poway, California, that killed one and left three injured.
“We are disturbed by the elevated levels of antisemitism across the state,” said Pasch, the regional director. “For years, we have called on elected officials, law enforcement, educators, civic leaders and community members to do more to combat antisemitism, and there is no more time to waste. As we have seen across the country, from the Tree of Life Synagogue to Poway to Monsey, the stakes are too high to allow anti-Jewish hate to go unchecked in Kentucky.”
To combat antisemitic hate and behavior, ADL continues its work through "investigation, advocacy and education."
ADL said it reached over 40,000 students in the region through its No Place for Hate and A World of Difference Institute bias and bullying prevention programs, in addition to training hundreds of additional students and educators through its antisemitism and Holocaust education programs.
The Cleveland Regional Office also launched a pro bono legal assistance project, through which the organization connects victims of antisemitism with civil litigators who who work for free, as well as a "Signature Synagogue Program," through which the group partners with synagogues to fight antisemitism and all forms of hate.
In response to the increase in incidents, the group says elected officials and civic leaders "must use their bully pulpits to speak out against antisemitism and all forms of hate and extremism."
Other policy recommendations include urging the Kentucky General Assembly to "hold hearings on the high levels of hate crimes, the rise of extremist groups and proliferation of their propaganda and support legislation that improves responses to hate crimes and domestic terror."
This year, lawmakers received some credit for passing a resolution that made Kentucky the first state to condemn antisemitism as defined by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance.
But a few weeks later, the state made headlines for very different reasons after the Kentucky Libertarian Party compared "vaccine passports" to star-shaped identification badges that Jews were forced to wear during the Holocaust.
The group says Kentucky should also increase nonprofit security grant funding for synagogues and other houses of worship, schools and community centers.
School districts should also offer Holocaust education as well as bias and bullying prevention programs, the audit says, and university leaders should "respond firmly and forcefully to antisemitic acts on campus, including incidents that target Jewish students because of their actual or perceived support of the state of Israel."
Lastly, the group says lawmakers "should support efforts to provide law enforcement officials with the tools and training they need to prevent and effectively respond to hate crimes" and that federal, state and local law enforcement agencies "should also improve their procedures for responding to and reporting hate crimes."
.https://www.courier-journal.com/story/news/local/2021/04/27/kentucky-sees-record-19-antisemitic-incidents-2020-audit-shows/7395757002/
  |
|
