Letters to the Editor: California, not just L.A., must find ways to fight antisemitism

To the editor: Guest contributor Rabbi Noah Farkas writes that antisemitism is “a Los Angeles problem” (“L.A. has more to do to fight antisemitism and protect Jewish residents,” June 4). It definitely is. But it is also a San Francisco Bay Area and San Diego problem, a California problem and an American problem. The lack of solidarity he speaks of in defense of civil rights, equity and equality for Jews is a state and national problem. We feel it as painfully and as palpably in Berkeley, Oakland and San Francisco as in Los Angeles. We struggle with the same challenges of being under-resourced to ensure the physical safety of Jewish community members at schools, senior centers, synagogues and community centers.

We struggle, too, with the lack of recognition and inclusion of the diversity of the Jewish community including Ethiopian, Mizrahi and Sephardic voices, as Farkas notes, as well as Asian, African American and Hispanic Jews in ethnic studies curricula. Jews at California schools and universities experience well-documented marginalization, gaslighting and invidious targeting through verbal and physical abuse and violence, harassment, exclusion and discrimination, as Farkas illustrates. We need action and allyship on a local, state and national level on a bipartisan basis across society and with the support of the full diversity of the American people. Only then will Jewish people in America be safe and only then will we come closer to achieving freedom, equality and access to justice for all.

Noam Schimmel, Berkeley
This writer is a lecturer in global studies at UC Berkeley.

..

To the editor: Farkas says L.A. must do more to fight antisemitism. This invites the question: Or what? What will the Jewish community of Los Angeles do if the government and citizens of the city and county of Los Angeles continue to ignore antisemitism? The word “must” implies that there will be consequences for failure to act. Farkas should lead the Jewish Federation in developing a plan of action that will hold Los Angeles’ leaders accountable for fighting antisemitism and that will impose actual consequences if those leaders fail.

Stuart Creque, Moraga, Calif.

..

To the editor: I doubt antisemitism is higher now than before. However, the expression of it certainly is. This is part of a general coarsening of public expression that was exacerbated in 2016 by a presidential candidate who called people names and is mean and confrontational. When he said that there were “very fine people on both sides” in 2017, he opened the Pandora’s box of hate that has its expression in vile and violent antisemitic attacks. As long as this tone is set from above, we will have violence, like that against lawmakers in Minnesota, and all sorts of hate-induced attacks. Measures that Farkas suggests will do little to counter this narrative of open expression of hate by our leaders.

Harlan Levinson, Los Angeles