FROM THE EDITOR'S DESK: Each one of us can sling a stone at antisemitism

In the midst of all the New Year’s reveling in the streets of Orlando, high above on an office building on Orange Avenue and Washington Street antisemitic messages “Vax the Jews,” “Honk if you hate Jews,” “Hitler was right” streamed over and over across the building’s top. According to clickorlando, no one below reacted to the sign. But news outlets and politicians across Central Florida and the nation soon began talking out against it.

Channel 6 reporter Eric von Ancken was right on top of it. I’m glad to see that our local news is bringing attention to this awful hate. On the streets downtown, von Ancken interviewed Shalom Orlando CEO Keith Dvorchik on a news broadcast. Dvorchik takes a lot of guff, even from our Jewish community, that the Federation isn’t doing enough about this. I’m glad Dvorchik was able to speak out about it on TV. Asked his reaction to this hatred, Dvorchik’s look on his face showed disappointment and frustration. “We’ve talked about this far too many times,” he told Ancken. “Jewish people remain the only group that is OK to hate.”

But it’s not OK and there are those who are speaking up against it — finally. Orlando Mayor Buddy Dyer condemned the hate message. “After learning about a recent display of antisemitism in our city, I want to clearly state that prejudice and hate aren’t welcome in Orlando and should always be condemned,” he posted on Twitter. “To the members of Orlando’s Jewish community: we stand with you, united against antisemitism and hatred.”

State Representative Anna Eskamani, D-Orlando, also spoke out against antisemitism here.

“It’s absolutely disgusting and those who espouse antisemitism are the scum of the Earth. Unfortunately, we have seen a rise of antisemitism …”

She continued, “Unfortunately, acts of hate never stop, so we must be vigilant in the face of such rhetoric and I encourage folks to support our local Holocaust Memorial Resource and Education Center as a means of taking action for a more peaceful and just world.”

Each one of us can speak out against antisemitism. Don’t think for a minute your voice does not matter or that you are alone. There are many organizations that stand behind you.

Laurie Cardoza Moore, president of Proclaiming Justice to the Nations and organizer of a pro-Israel rally in Orlando last year, jumped into action and wants to hold another press conference/public rally with community leaders speaking out in support of our Jewish brethren. “If we have a public show of support, we are sending a message to these Jew haters that Jew-hatred is not welcome here,” she wrote to me. “They may have gotten away with it where they come from, but we aren't tolerating it here! This is that goyim TV group [who moved their headquarters from California to Central Florida]. We need to make sure that they know that they can't roll into our city and peddle their hatred. International Holocaust Remembrance Day is coming. It is the same Jew hatred that led to Hitler's Final Solution. We need to display a show of force by calling for a press conference and reminding our community that we cannot allow these seeds of hatred to germinate. As Dietrich Bonhoeffer said; ‘Silence in the face of evil, is itself evil. G-d will not hold us guiltless. Not to speak, is to speak. Not to act, is to act.’”

StandWithUS, an international, pro-Israel education organization based in California saw the news release about the hate speech and tweeted “More hateful words targeting the Jewish community showed up on the side of a building on New Year’s Eve, this time in downtown Orlando: #StandUpToHatred. You can view the tweet HERE: https://twitter.com/StandWithUs/status/1610922473544974338

Jewish Federations of North America serves as a partner in a “Shine A Light” campaign across North America, bringing attention to the rise in Jew-hatred. Heritage ran an article about this campaign (“Shine A Light on Jew-hatred,” by Mike Wagenheim of JNS, Dec. 23, 2022) and I recently saw an excellent television commercial about antisemtic hatred sponsored by Shine A Light. It was an encouragement to me that this hatred is being addressed nationally.

In the article, Adam Teitelbaum, executive director at the Israel Action Network and associate vice president for public affairs at JFNA, told JNS “The ability to shine a light on the multiple ways in which antisemitism manifests in today’s society is an incredible opportunity for the coordination and collaboration of institutions across not only just the Jewish sector, but society writ large.”

Contributing writer, Marilyn Shapiro wrote an opinion piece in the Dec. 16 issue titled “We need more Davids to fight the Goliaths of antisemitism.” Fed up with the ongoing sales of the movie Kyrie Irving promoted (“Hebrews to Negroes: Wake Up, Black America”) with sales that escalated after the controversy, she took on the big online moguls to remove the movie and the book from their websites. Through her phone calls and letters, she managed to draw attention to the matter. The Orlando Sentinel published a letter to the editor she wrote and headlined it “Kyrie Irving’s hurtful views still spreading.”

In the Heritage article she wrote, “I feel as if I am David battling Goliath, ending unknown. But stone by stone, I will keep using my slingshot.”

Shapiro’s single-handed persistence is stoning antisemitism.

Another op-ed article (A campaign against Jew-hatred that actually worked) in the same issue, Karen Lehrman Bloch wrote about an AJC campaign in the 1970s led by advertising executive Richard Rothschild to spread anti-hate messages across the U.S. In a 1973 interview, Rothschild said that Nazism “sought to spread internal discord.” The campaign showed the evil of antisemitism and the importance of unity.

In conclusion, Bloch wrote, “It is essential for us today to learn the lessons of the AJC’s successful campaign. American Jews need to start using our brains and creativity to fight the antisemites now threatening us on three fronts — Islamists, white supremacists and the likes of the ‘Black Hebrew Israelites.”

Antisemitism has always been with us. I personally believe it is a spiritual battle because Torah teaches that G-d chose the Jewish people to accomplish His will on the Earth, and He isn’t finish yet. For this reason, the powers of darkness continue to sew their hatred in the minds of men. All the more reason to shine a light on hatred and never give up the fight. One other way is to see that every time hatred pops up its ugly head it is an opportunity for conversation.

“This is a good chance to start a conversation. It’s an excuse to start a conversation with people in the wider community,” said Teitelbaum. And conversations that have a beginning, don’t have to have an ending.

Martin Luther King, Jr., once said, “I am convinced that men hate each other because they fear each other. They fear each other because they don’t know each other, and they don’t know each other because they don’t communicate with each other, and they don’t communicate with each other because they are separated from each other.”

There are great stories in history of people whose minds were changed after relationships were slowly developed. But it has to start with each one of us, picking up that slingshot as Shapiro did and slinging that stone of discussion.