Other items in today’s column include:
*Fighting hate in San Diego County
*Recommended viewing/ reading
*In memoriam
SAN DIEGO — In a webcast sponsored by the Anti-Defamation League on Thursday, panelists Deborah Lipstadt of Emory University and Jonathan Sarna of Brandeis University were asked if a cure for coronavirus were to be discovered by a Jew, would that reduce anti-Semitism?
The two academicians, appearing alongside ADL’s CEO Jonathan Greenblatt, responded in the negative. Sarna pointed out that in the 1950s, when polio was the scourge that the world feared most, two Jews — Jonas Salk and Albert Sabin — each discovered a polio vaccine. At that time, according to Sarna, some Jews thought the world would be so appreciative that anti-Semitism might disappear. But that was not the way things worked out.
Lipstadt said that anti-Semitism is an irrational belief– a prejudgment about Jews — that as a people, Jews are bad. Asking if development of a vaccine would change the situation makes the mistake of hoping that an irrational person will have a rational response.
Sarna said if it turns out that a Jew comes up with the coronavirus vaccine, Jews will be proud, but before long the world would forget that the scientist responsible for the cure was Jewish. Nevertheless, he said, that would be a problem he’d hope Jews would have — the more important matter would be that the coronavirus would be eradicated.
Lipstadt said when there were early reports that Israeli scientists were working on a vaccine, some anti-Semites jumped on that make the sinister suggestion that Jews must have had some early warning of the disease. No one said anything similar about British researchers at Oxford, who also quickly began to seek a vaccine, she noted.
Salk–the founder of the Salk Institute for Biological Studies in La Jolla–was not the only San Diegan whose experience was invoked during the hour-long webcast. Several times the shooting was referenced at Chabad of Poway last year — which took the live of Lori Gilbert Kaye while wounding Rabbi Yisroel Goldstein, Almog Peretz and his elementary school-aged niece Noya Dahan.
Lipstadt said the world is seeing today a “perfect storm” of anti-Semitism which comes not only from the far right, as exemplified by the attacker in Poway, but also from the left, as was typified the British Labour party under the recently-replaced leader Jeremy Corbyn. Both versions of anti-Semitism are bad, yet have some discernible differences, Lipstadt suggested. Whereas the extreme right tends to be more vicious, and personal — as was the perpetrator who vandalized a synagogue in Huntsville, Alabama with such slogans as “white power” and “Gas all Jews,” the left tends to be more institutional in its approach, thereby spreading its message to more people.
Sarna agreed with Lipstadt generally but pointed out that left-wing haters, not right-wingers, were responsible for the attacks on Hassidic Jews in Brooklyn.
Concerning the issue of acceptance of Jews in the United States, Sarna said that there were many Jews who had thought that their co-religionists had been accepted as”white” in the eyes of the white Christian plurality in this country. “Then Pittsburgh happened and then Poway,” he said. By “Pittsburgh,” he referred to the fact that an armed intruder had murdered eleven people at the Tree of Life Synagogue in that city approximately six months before the Poway shooting.
Today, many bigots try to blame Asian-Americans for the coronavirus, seizing on the fact that Wuhan, China, is believed to have been where humans first contracted it. Asked what the Anti-Defamation League is doing to assist Asian-Americans as they face prejudice, Greenblatt mentioned three steps ADL has taken. First, he said, he joined former Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang in writing an Op-Ed calling out and condemning such prejudice. Second, the ADL is helping to provide training and advocacy for the Asian-American community, and third, it has offered use of its cyber tools for tracking anti-Asian acts, just as it tracks anti-Semitism.
In that regard, Greenblatt said an ADL report is due out in May that will quantify the increase in anti-Semitism in the United States in 2019.
*
Fighting hate in San Diego County
*Cheryl Rattner-Price, the San Diegan who is executive director of The Butterfly Project, says that school children learning about the Holocaust respond to “biography cards” that tell the stories of individual children as they experienced the deprivation, discrimination, persecution, and torture under the Nazi regime. “As we increase our biography card library, we have discovered that we may have one of the largest collections dedicated solely to the children of the Holocaust and we want to grow that even further! Getting even a few details from your family stories, about the town, the family business, or interests can help students identify more closely with these children.” The story of Victor Rona or Romania, pictured below, is one such biography card. if you can help The Butterfly Project develop another card, you are requested to contact Beth Licha, the program director, via her email.
*District Attorney Summer Stephan announced on Thursday that anyone needing to report a hate crime may call a Hate Crimes Hotline at (619) 515-8805, or fill out an online reporting form via this website. Stephan’s office messaged; “This tool can be used to report suspected hate crime against anyone, but we’re especially concerned right now that the Asian community will become targets of hate crime as we continue to respond to this pandemic. We know that people often don’t report hate crimes because of fear or shame, and we wanted to provide a direct avenue to encourage victims or witnesses to hate crimes to report. People can and should continue to report hate crimes to their local police departments and Sheriff’s Department. This additional reporting mechanism will act as a safety net and help ensure reports are reviewed and shared by law enforcement.”
*
Recommended viewing/ reading
*NBC News showed bands from the U.S. Armed Services and the Israel Defense Force jointly performing “Hatkivah” in honor of Holocaust survivor Abba Naor. The video clip may be viewed above.
*Dr. Jonathan Salk, whose father Jonas Salk discovered the polio vaccine, writes that his father would have counseled that the coronavirus is nature’s way of telling humanity that its evolution will depend on inter-dependence and cooperation, rather than competition. Thanks to Stuart Karasik for
forwarding this article from The Hill .
In Memoriam
*Jerry Levens, son of the late Rabbi Monroe Levens of Tifereth Israel Synagogue, has died, it was announced by Tifereth Israel Synagogue. He leaves behind his wife Rachel Levens; children Kurt, Shane, Lindsey, Sara and Kelly, 6 grandchildren, 6 great-grandchildren, and brother David Levens of Los Angeles. A private funeral for immediate family will be conducted on Friday, May 1, with a Zoom memorial service planned at 4 p.m., Sunday, May 3, according to a notice from the Conservative congregation.
*
Donald H. Harrison is editor of San Diego Jewish World. He may be contacted via donald.harrison@sdjewishworld.com Free obituaries in memory of members of the San Diego County Jewish community are sponsored on San Diego Jewish World by Inland Industries Group LP in memory of long-time San Diego Jewish community leader Marie (Mrs. Gabriel) Berg.