This Week in Jews
Nazi settlements, fascists in Idaho, a restaurant closure, and more.
But First
Give a listen to my latest episode of While You Were Sleeping in Hebrew School with Temple De Hirsch Sinai’s Rabbi Danny Weiner on the origins and meaning of the Reform movement.
No Policy
→ Last week the City of Kent settled with its assistant police chief for $1.5 million after he made numerous pro-Nazi references, including hanging SS insignia on his office door and joking that he lost his grandfather in the Holocaust—as a Nazi guard who fell out of a tower drunk. “It’s a horrifying situation to think that someone could do something so anti-Semitic and the only thing you can do is have a settlement of over a million dollars and the ability to be hired by another police department,” ADL’s Pacific Northwest director Miri Cypers told The Cholent. “It completely violates trust in law enforcement,” which is already frayed, she added.
As the Seattle Times reported, paying the settlement to Derek Kammerzell was the best option, given police union protections and the fact that there is no clear path of discipline for this kind of behavior. “In the process, we learned a lot about what are the different ways in which police officers can be disciplined in these instances,” Cypers said. “The city tried to make the harshest kind of discipline decisions within the confines of their limitations. The only thing they could do was create a settlement. It revealed a lot of serious flaws.” According to Cypers, ideas like decertifying officers with links to extremism are circulating on the policy level.
The Jewish Federation and JCRC joined outraged Kent citizens in condemning Kammerzell’s behavior, and they also held listening sessions that will hopefully open up conversations of diversity, equity, and inclusion to include Jewish concerns.
High Alert
→ At the same time, the local ADL has been responding to the arrest of 31 armed Patriot Front members who unloaded themselves from a U-Haul truck in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, on June 11, to cause trouble at a Pride event. Patriot Front is a fascist group that split off from the neo-Nazis and is active in Idaho as well as Washington. Since the arrest, Coeur d’Alene law enforcement officers have been getting doxxed and receiving death threats. “We’re on high alert,” said Cypers.
It Could Happen Here
→ Meanwhile, ADL has been labeled a “superoppressor” by BDS Boston, an anti-Zionist group that released a map of so-called imperialist and Zionist forces in the state. The map traffics in anti-Semitic tropes and highlights Jewish organizations, including Boston’s CJP, JCRC, and AJC offices as well as numerous philanthropic foundations.
According to Mapping Project organizers in an interview with Mondoweiss:
The Mapping Project is an effort to build a deep base of knowledge about Boston-area corporations, institutions, and other entities that are sustaining the colonization of Palestine, US imperialism, policing, displacement, and other interlocking systems of oppression. Through the map, we aim to help local movements identify strategic vulnerabilities of existing systems of power and imperial violence, in order to effectively weaken and dismantle them.
The project has been denounced across the political spectrum, including by Massachusetts Rep Ayanna Presley and Senator Elizabeth Warren. BDS Boston continues to stand by the project.
After the Storm
→ Bittersweet news for Seattle: Storm point guard and MOT Sue Bird will be hanging up her jersey after this season.
Check out her interview with the Washington State Jewish Historical Society.
No Schmaltz
→ In more sad news (how much can we take?), Schmaltzy’s delicatessen is throwing in the napkin. I’ve been following chef Jonny Silverberg since he started launching his latke press sandwiches from a truck two Jewish journalism jobs ago. His brick-and-mortar location couldn’t come back from the pandemic’s impact on the restaurant world. Schmaltzy’s joins the dearly departed Dacha Diner as victims of 2022. The deli’s last day is July 3.
That’s all for now. Shabbat shalom.
This Week Last Year
Community Announcements
Check out the Seattle Jewish community calendar and the virtual calendar.
This week’s parasha is Beha’alotecha.
Candlelighting in Seattle is at 8:51 p.m.
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