Anti-Semitic incidents in New Jersey went up by 32 percent last year, after growing by 15 percent the year before.
WASHINGTON — Anti-Semitic incidents in New Jersey rose by almost one-third in 2017, the first year of Donald Trump’s presidency, according to a report issued Tuesday.
The Anti-Defamation League’s annual Audit of Anti-Semitic incidents found 208 such occurrences in the Garden State, up 32 percent from 152 in 2016.
The occurrences included bomb threats against Jewish institutions, assaults and vandalism and were more than double the 15 percent increase recorded from 2015 to 2016.
“New Jersey’s sharp rise in anti-Semitic incidents this past year confirm what all of us have perceived: anti-Semitic incidents are proliferating and perpetrators of hate have become emboldened,” said Joshua Cohen, ADL’s New Jersey regional director.
Nationally, the number of incidents rose by 57 percent to 1,986 in 2017 from 1,267 a year earlier. They increased 35 percent from 2015 to 2016.
Anti-Semitic incidents rose during 2016 campaign
Among the incidents reported in New Jersey last year were three separate acts of vandalism of the Mahwah eruv, anti-Semitic flyers distributed in Monmouth and Ocean counties, and swastikas painted on buildings.
In non-Jewish elementary and secondary schools in the state, anti-Semitic incidents more than doubled to 61 from 29 in 2016 the report said. They included middle school students singing “Happy Birthday” to Hitler and a teacher’s online document vandalized with racist, sexist and anti-Semitic messages.
“The lid has been removed from the pot of hatred,” said Rep. Josh Gottheimer, D-5th Dist. “This is a result of what happens.”
Gottheimer joined then-Gov. Chris Christie, U.S. Sens. Cory Booker and Robert Menendez, D-N.J., and other officials in May at the Jewish Community Center in Tenafly, one of the New Jersey JCCs hit by bomb threats.
The most visible manifestation of anti-Semitism nationally last year occurred in August when neo-Nazis marched alongside white supremacists and chanted, “Jews will not replace us” in Charlottesville, Virginia. One counterprotester was killed when one of the demonstrators ran her over with his car.
Trump said there were some “very fine people” among the marchers and said there was “blame on both sides” for the violence.
Early in his term, the president was slow to criticize a rise in anti-Semitic attacks that erupted after his election.
During the campaign, Trump was criticized for using anti-Semitic memes, including using pictures of prominent Jews in his final advertisement as the narrator described “these people that don’t have your good in mind;” tweeted a picture of rival Hillary Clinton and a Jewish star against a background of dollar bills.
His theme of “America First” is the name of the World War II-era group that opposed fighting the Nazis and blamed the Jews for trying to push the U.S. into war.
Trump named Steve Bannon, who ran the Breitbart website that was a favorite of white supremacists, to a top post in his administration. U.S. Sen. Robert Menendez, D-N.J., used his speech before the American Israel Public Affairs Conference last year to condemn the “white nationalist dog whistles by Steve Bannon from the West Wing.”
Bannon since has left the Trump administration.
Just last week, a top Trump ally, National Rifle Association Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre, singled out only Jewish figures in his fiery and defiant speech to the Conservative Political Action Conference, accusing them of trying to impose socialism on the United States.
“Every time in every nation in which this political disease rises to power, its citizens are repressed, their freedoms are destroyed, and their firearms are banned and confiscated, and it’s all backed in this country by the social engineering and the billions of people like George Soros, Michael Bloomberg, Tom Steyer and more,” said LaPierre, whose organization spent $30 million to help elect Trump in 2016.
The Israeli newspaper Haaretz called it “expressions of dog-whistle anti-Semitism.”
Jonathan D. Salant may be reached at jsalant@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @JDSalant or on Facebook. Find NJ.com Politics on Facebook.
http://www.nj.com/politics/index.ssf/2018/02/anti-semitic_incidents_grew_after_trump_election_s.html