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‘F—k the Jews’: Car in Australia Vandalized With Antisemitic Graffiti in Latest Incident Against Jewish Community
Car in New South Wales, Australia graffitied with antisemitic message. Photo: Screenshot
The state of New South Wales in Australia has seen its latest antisemitic hate crime involving the destruction of property.
“F—k the Jews” was graffitied on a car that was parked in the Queens Park suburb of Sydney, the state capital, between 7 am Sunday and 5:45 am Monday, according to police. Since being discovered, the incident has prompted responses from national leaders and Jewish civil rights groups.
“There is no tolerance for antisemitism in Australia from my government, nor should there be tolerance from anyone else,” Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said during a press conference on Monday. “Antisemitism is a scourge, and any event such as this targeting people because of who they are is not the Australian values that I hold dear and the Australian values that are held dear by, overwhelmingly, Australians.”
The New South Wales (NSW) Jewish Board of Deputies added, “We are appalled and saddened at the antisemitic graffiti which was daubed on a private vehicle in Queens Park this morning. It is unacceptable that Jewish Australians and Australians of all backgrounds have had to wake up yet again and see messages of hate prominently displayed in their neighborhoods.”
The group continued, “We cannot allow ourselves to become desensitized to acts of Jew-hatred and allow illegal conduct such as this to become normalized.”
As previously reported by The Algemeiner, antisemitic hatred in Australia, especially New South Wales, driven both by a wave of “old” antisemitism and a “new” iteration of it fueled by anti-Zionism, is rising. Last month, the home of a prominent Jewish Australian, Lesli Berger, was vandalized with antisemitic graffiti, with the perpetrators spray-painting a swastika on the perimeter wall of the property. Next to the infamous Nazi symbol were the spray-painted words “Jordan Gayter,” believed to be a misspelling of the German phrase for “Juden Gatter,” or “Jewish Gate.”
Berger explained to a local outlet, J-Wire, that he does not believe the crime directly targeted him, noting that the high population of Jewish residents in his neighborhood, the Bellevue Hill section of the city of Sydney, is common knowledge.
“It’s clear this was a hate crime targeting the Jewish area, although not me personally,” he said. “The perpetrators likely understood this is a predominantly Jewish area. It’s highly unlikely that anyone would specifically identify my home — it was more opportunistic.”
Justice has so far been elusive, he added, noting that local police discontinued their investigation of the incident after a forensic analysis of the area near the crime and the perusing of closed-circuit television (CCTV) cameras failed to yield new evidence that could help with identifying and capturing a suspect. While Berger did not condemn law enforcement’s pausing the criminal inquiry, he stressed the importance of addressing antisemitic hate crimes in the area, a growing problem in Australia in recent years.
Also last month, someone graffitied “Kill Israel” on the garage door of a home in the Woollahra section of Sydney, an incident described by NSW Jewish Board of Deputies leader David Ossip as continuing a “sustained campaign of intimidation, harassment, and terror against the Jewish community.”
Antisemitism across the country quadrupled to record levels between 2023-2024, with Australian Jews experiencing more than 2,000 antisemitic incidents between October 2023 and September 2024, according to a report published by the Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ), an organization which advocates upholding the civil rights of the country’s some 120,000 Jewish citizens.
In the aftermath of the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas’s massacre across southern Israel last Oct. 7, a total of 2,062 anti-Jewish incidents were recorded in Australia, far more than the 495 documented in the previous 12-month period and the most since the ECAJ began tracking such data in 1990.
Notably, the total did not include antisemitic statements made on social media. However, it did include dozens of assaults and hundreds of incidents of property destruction and hate speech. Physical assaults recorded by the group jumped from 11 in 2023 to 65 in 2024. The level of antisemitism for the past year was six times the average of the preceding 10 years.
“Whilst the number of reported antisemitic incidents has fluctuated from year to year previously, there has never been anything like an annual increase of this magnitude,” ECAJ research director Julie Nathan said in a statement accompanying the report. “If anything, the raw numbers understate the seriousness of the surge in antisemitism that has occurred. There have been many new forms and expressions of anti-Jewish racism that would once have been considered alien to Australia but which have become commonplace.”
Additionally, the number of attacks on Jews — digital, political, and physical — has skyrocketed in Australia since Hamas’s atrocities last Oct. 7. In just the first seven and a half weeks after the onslaught, antisemitic activity in Australia increased by a staggering 591 percent, according to a tally of incidents by the ECAJ.
In one notorious episode in the immediate aftermath of the Oct. 7 attack, hundreds of pro-Hamas protesters gathered outside the Sydney Opera House chanting “gas the Jews,” “f—k the Jews,” and other epithets.
This explosion of hate has also included vandalism and threats of gun violence, as well as incidents such as a brutal attack on a Jewish man in a park in Sydney. ECAJ’s report detailed other similar incidents. For example, a male assailant repeatedly punched a Jewish man while screaming “dirty rotten Jew c—t”; a group of young men jumped a Jewish boy, whom they called a “dirty Jew”; and pro-Hamas protesters “spat on, threatened, and kicked” an elderly Jewish woman during a demonstration held to raise awareness of antisemitism.
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
The post ‘F—k the Jews’: Car in Australia Vandalized With Antisemitic Graffiti in Latest Incident Against Jewish Community first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Majority of New York City Hate Crimes Targeted Jews in 2024, New Data Shows
Anti-Israel protesters target a synagogue in Queens, New York on July 14, 2024. Photo: Screenshot
Jews were targeted in the majority of hate crimes perpetrated in New York City last year, according to new data issued by the New York City Police Department (NYPD).
On Monday, the NYPD released its end-of-year crime report, which recorded a precipitous drop in crime overall but also the disturbing numbers on antisemitic hate crimes. Out of the 641 total hate crimes tallied by the NYPD, 345 targeted Jews, which, in addition to being a 7 percent increase over the previous year, amounted to 54 percent of all hate crimes in the city.
As The Algemeiner previously reported, antisemitic hate crimes in 2024 posed a major threat to the quality of life of New York City’s Orthodox Jewish community, which was the target in many of the incidents. In just eight days between the end of October and the beginning of November, three Hasidim, including children, were brutally assaulted in the Crown Heights section of Brooklyn. In one instance, an Orthodox man was accosted by two assailants, one masked, who “chased and beat him” after he refused to surrender his cellphone in compliance with what appeared to have been an attempted robbery.
In another incident, an African American male smacked a 13-year-old Jewish boy who was commuting to school on his bike in the heavily Jewish neighborhood. Less than a week earlier, an assailant slashed a visibly Jewish man in the face as he was walking in Brooklyn.
Days after the week-long antisemitic hate crime spree, three men attempted to rob a Hasidic man after stalking him through the Crown Heights neighborhood.
The explosion of hate continued a trend. In 2023, antisemitic incidents accounted for a striking 65 percent of all felony hate crimes in New York City, according to a report issued in August by New York state comptroller Thomas DiNapoli. The report added that throughout the state, nearly 44 percent of all recorded hate crime incidents and 88 percent of religious-based hate crimes targeted Jews.
Other major cities and states have recently reported increases in antisemitic hate crimes.
In Los Angeles County, antisemitic hate crimes rose 91 percent in 2023, from 127 the prior year to 242 in what the LA County Commission on Human Relations (LACCHR) described as “the largest number of anti-Jewish crimes ever” in the city.
Additionally, the state of Massachusetts saw more antisemitic hate crimes in 2023 than at any time since government officials began tracking such data eight years ago, according to a report issued by its Executive Office of Public Safety and Security (EOPSS).
A striking 119 antisemitic hate crimes were reported to law enforcement agencies, EOPSS said, a total which, in addition to eclipsing 2015’s total of 56 incidents, amounts to a 70 percent increase over the previous year. Antisemitic hate crimes also constituted 18.8 percent of all hate crimes reported in 2023, a figure which trails only behind the percentage of hate crimes which targeted African Americans.
The report added that 68.9 percent of the antisemitic incidents involved property destruction or vandalism, a total of 82, while another 19 percent involved intimidation. Some physical assaults, six, were recorded or reported to the police.
“The local increase reflects national trends. Our data showed that over 10,000 antisemitic incidents were recorded in the US since Oct. 7, 2023, an over 200 percent increase compared to incidents reported to us during the same period a year before,” Peggy Shukur, vice president of the ADL’s East Division, told The Algemeiner when the information became public. “Behind every one of these numbers are people who have experienced the harm, fear, intimidation, and pain that reverberates from each of these incidents. The fact that numbers increase by 70 percent is a grim reminder that antisemitism continues to infect our communities in real and pervasive ways.”
Overall, anti-Jewish hate crimes in the US spiked to a record high in 2023, and American Jews were the most targeted of any religious group in the country, according to a report released by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) in September.
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
The post Majority of New York City Hate Crimes Targeted Jews in 2024, New Data Shows first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Trump Vows ‘Hell Will Break Out in the Middle East’ if Gaza Hostages Not Released by His Inauguration
US President-elect Donald Trump makes remarks at Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Florida, US, Jan. 7, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Carlos Barria
US President-elect Donald Trump on Tuesday reiterated his threat to seek retaliation against Hamas if the Palestinian terrorist group does not release the remaining hostages in the Gaza Strip.
“If [the hostages] aren’t back by the time I get in office, all hell will break out in the Middle East, and it will not be good for Hamas. And it will not be good, frankly, for anyone. All hell will break out,” Trump told reporters.
Trump made the comments during a wide-ranging press conference at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Florida. He stood alongside Steve Witkoff, the recently appointed special envoy to the Middle East for his incoming administration.
“They should’ve never taken them. They should’ve never been the attacker of Oct. 7, but there was. Many people [were] killed. They’re no longer hostages,” Trump added.
On Oct. 7 of last year, Hamas-led Palestinian terrorists murdered 1,200 people and kidnapped 251 hostages to Gaza during their invasion of southern Israel. During the onslaught, 45 Americans were killed and 12 were abducted.
About 100 hostages, both dead and alive, remain in Gaza, including seven Americans. Three of them — Keith Siegel, Sagui Dekel-Chen, and Edan Alexander — are thought to still be alive. Three others — Itay Chen, Gadi Haggai, and Judi Weinstein Haggai — are believed to be murdered by the terrorist group, with their bodies still in the Palestinian enclave. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) revealed last month that Israeli-American hostage Omer Neutra was killed during the Oct. 7, 2023 attacks, and his body was taken by terrorists into Gaza. Neutra was initially presumed to be among the living captives.
In total, 100 hostages remain in Gaza, and at least a third of them are believed to be dead.
Trump said on Tuesday that families of hostages have approached him in tears, desperately begging for a deal to secure their loved ones’ release from captivity.
The president-elect emphasized the importance of dispatching a “great negotiator” to broker a ceasefire deal to halt fighting between Israel and Hamas in Gaza and free the remaining hostages, gesturing to Witkoff. Trump added that although he does “not want to hurt the negotiations,” he believes that reiterating his threats to unleash “hell” across the Middle East will incentivize Hamas to reach a deal in the upcoming weeks.
Trump has repeatedly vowed to take aggressive action to secure the return of the remaining hostages. He has previously promised that Hamas will have “hell to pay” if the terrorist group does not release those still held captive in the Gaza Strip.
“Everybody is talking about the hostages who are being held so violently, inhumanely, and against the will of the entire World, in the Middle East – But i’’s all talk, and no action!” Trump posted last month on the social media platform Truth Social. “Please let this TRUTH serve to represent that if the hostages are not released prior to January 20, 2025, the date that I proudly assume Office as President of the United States, there will be ALL HELL TO PAY in the Middle East, and for those in charge who perpetrated these atrocities against Humanity.”
“Those responsible will be hit harder than anybody has been hit in the long and storied History of the United States of America. RELEASE THE HOSTAGES NOW!” he added.
The post Trump Vows ‘Hell Will Break Out in the Middle East’ if Gaza Hostages Not Released by His Inauguration first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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US Lawmaker Says Washington Funding Taliban, Pens Letter Urging Trump to Halt Aid
US Rep. Tim Burchett (R-TN) on Dec. 5, 2024. Photo: Mattie Neretin / CNP/Sipa USA via Reuters Connect
US Rep. Tim Burchett (R-TN) recently penned a letter to President-elect Donald Trump claiming that Washington is “funneling” money to the Taliban government in Afghanistan and calling on his incoming administration to stop such foreign aid, citing the Taliban’s extensive history of supporting Islamist terrorism.
“I write to express my strong concerns with foreign aid being funneled to the Taliban and my desire to work with your administration to stop tax dollars from going to terrorists,” Burchett wrote in the letter dated Jan. 2. “It was brought to my attention the US State Department, under the Biden administration, was funneling money to the Taliban.”
Burchett claimed that after questioning US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, the top American diplomat “admitted that non-governmental organizations paid nearly $10 million of foreign aid to the Taliban in taxes.”
The lawmaker said that sending foreign aid to the Taliban undermines US national security, arguing that American government agencies are incapable of tracking how the Islamist movement spends US dollars.
“The larger issue, which Secretary Blinken failed to acknowledge, is the shipments of cash payments in United States dollars to Afghanistan’s central bank,” Burchett wrote. “These cash shipments are auctioned off and after that, they are nearly impossible to track. This is how the Taliban is being funded and plans to fund terrorism around the world.”
We have got to quit funding the Taliban under @realDonaldTrump. $40 million a week to our enemies is a slap in the face to those who served. pic.twitter.com/MVgMnSo1Gn
— Rep. Tim Burchett (@RepTimBurchett) January 6, 2025
The lawmaker did not provide any direct evidence in the letter to support his claims, although the US has provided extensive aid to Afghanistan. According to an October 2023 report from the US Agency for International Development (USAID), the US has provided nearly $2 billion in humanitarian assistance for Afghans since mid-August 2021, making Washington the largest humanitarian donor in Afghanistan. It is unclear how much of that money has ended up in the hands of the Taliban, which the US and other countries have designated as a terrorist group.
“The United States of America should not fund its enemies abroad. I implore you to take action to put an end to wasteful foreign aid spending and to support efforts in Congress to put Americans first,” Burchett wrote. “I look forward to working with you during your second term as president.”
Burchett added that he plans on reintroducing legislation that would require the State Department to “discourage foreign countries from providing financial or material support to the Taliban, and to report on direct-cash assistance programs and Taliban influence over Afghanistan’s central bank.”
He claimed that while the bill — first introduced in 2023 — passed the US House “unanimously,” Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) refused to bring the bill to the floor for a vote.
Following the release of Burchett’s letter, billionaire and X/Twitter owner Elon Musk, who will serve in the Trump administration as co-head of the Department of Government Efficiency, sparked a debate online regarding the allegations.
“Are we really sending US taxpayer money to the Taliban?” Musk wrote on X on Monday.
The distribution of American taxpayer dollars to Afghanistan has emerged as a hot-button issue for Republicans in recent months. In December, US Rep. Brian Mast (R-FL) blasted Blinken over the transfer of US dollars to the country.
“There’s an American citizen out there, literally woke up this morning losing 30% of their paycheck. And a good percentage of that is going to the Taliban or other programs abroad,” Mast said. “And this is something that we all need to think about, and we will be thinking about deeply for the next two years. There’s a joke that’s made often out there about kids going to college to learn basket weaving, and what a joke that would be. But the United States right now is literally sending tens of millions of dollars to the Taliban. 14.9 million, to be exact, to teach Afghans how to do carpet weaving.”
“Even worse, by the numbers, we spent $9 billion to resettle 90,000 roughly Afghan refugees here since the fall of Afghanistan. My simple Army math tells me that’s about $100,000 a person. That’s absurd. So my question for you. We do not even have an embassy in Afghanistan. We have no diplomats there. What are we doing giving them $1?” Mast continued.
The Taliban infamously provided a safe haven for al Qaeda before the 9/11 attacks and was accused of sheltering Osama bin Laden and his terrorist group afterward. A US-led military coalition subsequently removed the Taliban from power in Afghanistan in 2001.
In 2021, however, the Taliban once again seized power in Afghanistan, amid US President Joe Biden’s military withdrawal from the country.
The post US Lawmaker Says Washington Funding Taliban, Pens Letter Urging Trump to Halt Aid first appeared on Algemeiner.com.