Oct. 7 Should Be Foremost
After reading “As Part of Interfaith Coalition, Bolton Street Synagogue Rallies for Racial Justice,” (March 1), I would like to offer the following comments. I most assuredly believe that everyone is entitled to their opinion and the right to support whichever cause they choose. That being said, I can’t help but wonder if many people really understand the Black Lives Matter organization, what it represents, their mission and where their money goes.
The founder of a Black Lives Matter chapter in Minnesota said he quit after learning the “ugly truth” about the activist group’s priorities. “In 2015, I was the founder of Black Lives Matter in St. Paul,” Rashad Turner, the president and executive director of Minnesota Parent Union, said in a YouTube video called “The Truth Revealed about BLM.”
“I believed the organization stood for exactly what the name implies — black lives do matter,” he said in the video for TakeCharge Minnesota, a group opposing the idea that systemic racism is to blame for problems in U.S. society. “However, after a year on the inside, I learned they had little concern for rebuilding black families.”
While one situation does not negate another, the atrocities committed in Israel on Oct. 7 should be foremost on the mind of Jews everywhere. A bloody and chaotic rampage through civilian areas resulted in incomprehensible crimes against innocent people.
Those attacks launched a frightening global rise in antisemitism. Students being chased on college campuses have not even had the support of the administration. Many administrators have been unwilling to denounce this hateful behavior. An angry mob stormed the airport in the Russian city of Makhachkala intending to attack a flight arriving from Tel Aviv on Oct. 29. The incidents are too numerous to mention.
Israel and all Jews need the support of everyone worldwide.
Marla Gale
Sparks Glencoe
