Day: February 16, 2017

Jewish Community Centers Being Terrorized By Phone…

With Donald J. Trump’s campaign and rise to power  threats made to Jewish Community Centers have increased as well. 48 JCCs in 27 states and one Canadian province received upwards of 60 bomb threats during January. The majority of the threats were made during three days: January 9, 18 and 31. Several JCCs, including Orlando’s, received multiple threats.

Is this simply coincidental? Or did the tone of the Trump campaign and inauguration, with its obvious appeal to xenophobia and America First nationalism, encourage overt anti-Semitism and anti Muslim  activity? It certainly is plausible that the increase is at least partially the result of the tone set by Trump.

(CNN) – Samantha Taylor was at Orlando’s Jewish Community Center for a morning meeting when she heard reports of a bomb threat crackle from the director’s walkie-talkie.

Her daughter attends preschool there; she ran to the classroom and evacuated with the students and teachers.
While police and bomb-sniffing dogs searched the building for several hours, the teachers kept the children calm and happy at a safe spot down the street, Taylor said. No explosives were found.
 
 
On the same day, January 4, an Orlando Chabad center also received a threatening call, marking the first trickle in what would soon swell to waves of calls menacing Jewish institutions across the country.
 
In a statement, the FBI said the bureau and the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division are “investigating possible civil rights violations in connections with threats to Jewish Community Centers across the country.”
 
The JTA, a Jewish news agency, says it has obtained a recording of one of the calls. On it, the caller says a C-4 bomb has been placed in the JCC and that “a large number of Jews are going to be slaughtered.”
 
Several JCC sources said the FBI has told them it is investigating the calls as hate crimes. Online, another term has circulated: “telephone terrorism.”
 
“I’ve been in the business for 20-plus years, and this is unprecedented,” said Paul Goldenberg, national director of the Secure Community Network, which advises Jewish organizations on security. “It’s more methodical than meets the eye.”
No bombs have been found, but Jewish leaders hesitate to label the calls “hoaxes.” The chaos and terror the calls have caused are real, as are more tangible consequences.
 
JCCs across the country are bolstering security and holding town halls to calm frightened parents. Still, several centers have seen students withdraw from their early childhood education programs, typically reliable sources of revenue. As a result, some are slashing budgets, cutting staff and holding emergency fundraisers.
Making America Great Again does not, and should not, include this kind of rising hatred towards certain religious, ethnic, or cultural groups that differs from our own. Our fellow Americans, indeed fellow human beings do not deserve this.
Trump should be speaking out against hate, not turning a blind eye to it or inadvertently and indirectly encouraging it through words and action.

New York City Experiencing Rise In Hate Crimes…

POLITICO – There were 56 hate crimes reported in New York City as of Sunday, Feb. 12, up from just 31 incidents over the same time period last year, according to figures released today by the New York Police Department.

The increase was led by a rise in anti-Semitic crimes, which jumped from 13 to 28. No other category of hate crime was in double digits.

The uptick follows a national trend, in which activists and police are fielding more reports of hate crimes, which began last year. In early November, New York City police officials reported 314 hate crimes to that point in the year, surpassing the 309 that had been reported in all of 2015. (In one incident, an off-duty NYPD officer and Brooklyn native, who is Muslim, was attacked, along with her teenage son.)

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Some critics cast doubt on local tallies of hate crimes, preferring the annual figures released by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, since they apply one standard definition of a hate crime to incidents that take place throughout the nation’s various police districts.

HateCrimesNYCFeb122017

Could it be possible that the increase is related to the xenophoba and nationalism the Trump phenomenon usered into America?

Republicans Block Obama Regulation Preventing Mentally Ill From Firearm Purchase/Ownership…

WASHINGTON — The Republican-led Senate voted Wednesday to block an Obama-era regulation that would prevent an estimated 75,000 people with mental disorders from being able to purchase a firearm. The measure now goes to President Donald Trump, who is expected to sign it.

The regulation was crafted as part of President Barack Obama’s efforts to strengthen the federal background check system in the wake of the 2012 massacre of 20 young students and six staff at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut. Adam Lanza, a 20-year-old man with a variety of impairments, including Asperger’s syndrome and obsessive-compulsive disorder, shot and killed his mother at their home, then went to school where he killed the students, adults and himself.

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The 57-43 vote to revoke the regulation sends the measure to Trump.

With a Republican ally in the White House, the GOP has moved aggressively on several fronts to rescind some of the Obama administration’s final regulations on the environment, financial reporting and now guns. Under an expedited process established through the Congressional Review Act, a regulation is made invalid when a simple majority of both chambers pass a joint resolution of disapproval and the president signs it.

Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) spearheaded the repeal effort and said the regulation unfairly stigmatizes the disabled and infringes on their constitutional right to bear arms. He said that the mental disorders covered through the regulation are filled with “vague characteristics that do not fit into the federal mentally defective standard” prohibiting someone from buying or owning a gun.

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Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) said he didn’t know how he could explain to his constituents that Congress was making it easier rather than harder for people with serious mental illness to have a gun.

“If you can’t manage your own financial affairs, how can we expect that you’re going to be a responsible steward of a dangerous, lethal firearm,” Murphy said.

Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) argued that anyone who thinks they’re treated unfairly can appeal, and are likely to win if they’re not a danger to themselves or others. But Grassley said federal law requires a formal hearing and judgment before depriving someone of owning a firearm due to mental illness.

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“This heartless resolution puts the most vulnerable Americans at risk,” said Dan Gross, president of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence. “Make no mistake, this vote was really about deepening the gun industry’s customer pool, at the expense of those in danger of hurting themselves or others.”

Once again we see the Republicans in congress and the National Rifle Association putting firearms sales ahead of public safety. There exists no earthly reason why individuals with a history of mental illness should be able to purchase and own firearms.

Individuals who were put on the list and prevented from purchasing or owning a firearm could appeal the decision. If they could demonstrate they were no danger to themselves or others they were likely to win their appeal.

Americans support for stricter firearm control is up sharply.