Remarks as delivered June 27th, 2024
Thank you-
I join you all here this morning on behalf of ADL, the oldest anti-hate organization in the United States, alongside my good friend Marc Morial, President of the National Urban League, and our partners - Assembly members Brian Cunningham, Nily Rozic, Grace Lee, Jennifer Rajkumar and Pastor Johnnie Green. In addition. We are very grateful to Dr. Hazel Dukes of the NY NAACP, an icon of the civil rights movement for lending her strong words of support to this effort – few speak truth to power like Hazel Dukes.
But we gather this morning to say with one united voice:
Enough is enough.
Right now, the Jewish community is facing a crisis of exploding antisemitism that has risen to the level of a national emergency.
We are experiencing a tsunami of anti-Jewish hate so severe it is drawing the attention of those at the highest levels of our state and federal governments, and we are grateful to see momentum here, today, behind a new initiative to #UnMaskHate.
Since October 7th, acts of antisemitism have surged to levels not seen in generations.
Our houses of worship, our communities, our students on campuses like Columbia, have experienced intimidation, harassment, marginalization, threats, and violence.
And let’s be honest about the facts.
They are being targeted not because they are cheering the war in Gaza. They are not. No one is.
They are not being targeting because they are representatives of the Israeli government. They are not. None of them are.
They are not being targeted because they believe in the right of the state of Israel to exist. We call that Zionism. And the overwhelming majority of Americans hold this view.
No, these people are being targeting simply because they are Jews.
They are being targeted for no other reason other than their faith, their ethnicity, their identities… and this is unacceptable. It is unimaginable. It is un-American.
This is not about political speech. Don’t let anyone gaslight you.
To paraphrase Van Jones, you protest a policy, not a people. You protest with your voice and your heart, not with clubs and bear spray.
Dr. King. John Lewis. Gloria Steinem. Harvey Milk. These were heroes who took risks. These were activists bravely confronted people in power and stood behind their ideas despite very real risks.
Today, these aren’t activists. These are antagonists who cowardly confront people without power. These are hoodlums who conceal their identities so they menace and threaten their fellow Americans with impunity – in front of a synagogue, on a subway train, in front of a memorial to murdered teenagers.
Over the last several months we have seen such hateful conduct erupt into all-out violence – on our streets, on our campuses and beyond.
And, time and again, many of those who are engaged in this behavior wear masks to conceal their identities and to terrorize their targets.
They feel emboldened. Masks give them carte blanche to assault people, to vandalize buildings, to wreak havoc and yet to avoid any consequences for conduct that crosses the line.
Our community simply cannot afford to sit idly by and pretend that these are peaceful protestors exercising their rights. Nothing could be farther from the truth.
This isn’t about infringing on the right to free speech.
This isn’t about undermining the right to protest.
This isn’t about preventing the right to assembly.
This isn’t about inhibiting anyone from wearing medical masks for health and safety reasons.
However, this is about protecting the health and ensuring the safety of the vast majority of New Yorkers and Americans because no one should be terrorized. And, look, in the past the victims were African Americans, in the present the victims are American Jews, and in the future it could be any other marginalized community.
This is about isolating those individuals and groups who think it is permissible to harass and intimidate others simply because of who they are, how they pray or where they’re from.
This is simply abhorrent.
These individuals are employing the same tactics of hate groups throughout history, from the Ku Klux Klan to the Proud Boys to the January 6 insurrectionists to Neo Nazis marching throughout the country over the past 12 months.
ADL has a legacy of countering such tactics, and today, we are committed to supporting this vital initiative to restore and strengthen New York's masked harassment and intimidation laws.
We are grateful that so many in New York, including our partners at the National Urban League, agree and are standing united on this issue affecting BOTH of our communities.
This campaign is about keeping all of us in marginalized communities safer and preventing masked intimidation and harassment against any community, the LGBTQ+, Black, Latino, and Asian American communities, who have all experienced spikes in hate crimes and hate-filled incidents in the last several years.
We thank our leaders here today who are supporting this effort, and strongly urge all New Yorkers to join this campaign to reinstate and strengthen New York’s laws and ensure that those who hide their identities to harass and intimidate others, not only Jews, but anyone anywhere, will be held accountable.
Let’s launch this campaign.
Let's get the strongest legislation passed and send it to Governor Hochul.
Let’s set the bar for the rest of America to follow our lead.
Let’s Unmask Hate here in New York and across the nation.