Maloney, pols, faith leaders: End the hate
BY ALEJANDRA O’CONNELLDOMENECH
“Never again, never again,” shouted
Congressmember Carolyn Maloney in
the midst of a crowd of elected offi cials,
religious leaders and Upper East Side
residents on March 17.
The congressmember organized the
gathering outside of the Upper East Side
campus of Asphalt Green on Sunday in
light of the several swastikas and slur
found drawn inside the fi tness center’s
family locker room last week.
The crude drawings, made with
a marker, were yet another reminder
that acts of anti-Semitism
are rising in New York City. To
make matters even more somber,
the gathering occurred just
days after 50 Muslim worshipers
were killed during a mass
shooting by a white supremacist
in Christchurch, New Zealand.
“We are here today to speak
out, to speak out against anti-
Semitism, to speak out against
Islamophobia and to speak out
against racism, to speak out
against all hate,” Maloney declared
after quoting Martin Niemoller, a
Lutheran minister who was an outspoken
critic of Hitler.
According to Maloney, in order to
prevent large-scale acts of hate like the
shootings at the Christchurch mosques
and at a Pittsburgh synagogue last year,
leaders must speak out against small acts
of violence. If not, hatred will spread like
a virus and allow another dark chapter in
history like the Holocaust to repeat itself,
she and others warned.
Other leaders at the rally included
Reverend Al Sharpton, Councilmembers
Ben Kallos and Keith Powers, state Senator
Liz Krueger, Assemblymember Dan
Quart, Rabbi Arthur Schneier of Park
East Synagogue, Imam Qazi Qayoom,
Rabbi Chaim Steinmetz of Kehilath Jeshurun,
Rabbi Joel Mosbacher of Temple
Shaaray Tefi la, Charles Temel, president
of the Jewish Community Relations
Council of New York, and Rabbi Andrue
Kahn of Congregation Emanu-El.
All spoke of the importance of
promoting peaceful relations between
the city’s multitude of ethnic
groups and religions.
But while the leaders spoke
of peace, some members of the
public who were looking on began
to boo when Sharpton approached
the podium.
“Remember Crown Heights!”
some of them shouted. It was a
reference to the deadly rioting in
Brooklyn in August 1991 that saw
a Jew and another man killed after
a rabbi’s car fatally struck a young
black boy and seriously injured another
black child.
While Maloney decried anti-Semitism
and touted her newly reintroduced Never
Again Education Act, some slammed her
response to Representative Ilhan
Omar’s comments that led to
the recent Anti-Semitism
and Bigotry Resolution in
Congress. Manyhave
criticised the resolution
— which initially was focused
on stamping out anti-Semitic
rhetoric — as being too lax.
In February, Omar responded
to journalist Glenn Greenwald
after he tweeted a comment
about House G.O.P. Leader
Kevin McCarthy threatening to
punish Omar for criticizing Israel.
Omar responded by tweeting,
“It’s all about the Benjamins
Baby,” referencing a song by the
rapper Puff Daddy.
Rabbi Schneier
of Park East Synagogue
called
a n t i -S e m i t i s m
“a virus,” and
recalled how his
own family fled
Austria and lost
members in the
Holocaust.
Some took offense at Omar’s comment,
believing it perpetuated a harmful
stereotype about Jews.
In another tweet, Omar stated that the
American Israel Public Affairs Committee,
or AIPAC, funded Republican support
of Israel. Omar apologized for her
statements in a tweet but remained fi rm
on her criticism of AIPAC’s lobbying.
Shortly afterward, at a bookstore in
Washington, Omar made a comment
that some interpreted as
her stating that Jewish
Americans
hold dual allegiance
to the U.S.
and Israel. It’s a
trope that has been
used to justify violence
against Jews for centuries.
When asked if she had any plans on
how to stop anti-Semitic rhetoric in the
political sphere, Maloney reiterated the
message of the day: Calling out anti-
Semitism at the local level and educating
people about it locally will help prevent it
at the national level.
In the meantime, there has been no
update on the investigation into the hateful
graffi ti that was scrawled at Asphalt
Green.
Reverend Al Sharpton
called for unity. A few
people in the crowd
heckled him over comments
he made 26 years
ago about the Crown
Heights riot.
PHOTOS BY ALEJANDRA O’CONNELL-DOMENECH
Like other speakers, Imam Qazi
Qayoom, from Jackson Heights,
Queens, mentioned the horrific
mass shootings in two mosques in
Christchurch, New Zealand, that
had occurred just two days earlier.
8 March 21 - April 3, 2019 MEX Schneps Media